Latest / Let's Talk Trail Running / 2025 Trail Runner of the Year (TROY) Finalists Discussion and Picks Companion Podcast

Transcript

2025 Trail Runner of the Year (TROY) Finalists Discussion and Picks Companion Podcast · Let's Talk Trail Running

0:01
hello hello hello and welcome to let's talk trail running this
0:04
is your host robert
0:06
prosser and this is the show where we talk about all things
0:09
fantasy free trail
0:12
trail racing related and upcoming trail events and the goal of
0:17
the show is to make
0:19
SPEAKER_01: you a more educated fan of the trail running space
0:23
to create and educate new fans as they come into trail running
0:29
and really to
0:29
SPEAKER_01: preview races and upcoming events,
0:31
SPEAKER_01: the athletes that are racing them,
0:33
SPEAKER_01: the hype of the race,
0:35
SPEAKER_01: what's going on,
0:36
SPEAKER_01: what the aspects of the course are.
0:39
SPEAKER_01: And this will be,
0:41
SPEAKER_01: I think,
0:41
SPEAKER_01: the last episode of the year in my first ever year of doing this podcast.
0:45
SPEAKER_01: That's exciting.
0:46
SPEAKER_01: Based off what Substack said, I think this is my 31st podcast.
0:50
SPEAKER_01: So we're going to go with that.
0:51
So for everyone that's been listening or that started listening
0:54
along the way,
0:54
SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate your support.
0:56
SPEAKER_01: We have an exciting episode today.
0:58
SPEAKER_01: Instead of previewing a race,
0:59
we're going to do something a little bit different because we
1:02
have gotten to the
1:03
end of our racing year here in North America and just really
1:07
the end of the year in
1:08
SPEAKER_01: general now that we're in December.
1:09
SPEAKER_01: And we are going to talk about Trail Runner of the Year.
1:14
SPEAKER_01: So Troy, T-R-O-Y.
1:17
SPEAKER_01: It is the voting process that Fantasy for Each All put together,
1:21
SPEAKER_01: I want to say in 2022,
1:24
SPEAKER_01: if I'm not mistaken.
1:25
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to double check.
1:28
2022 that is correct uh and the goal was there's always been
1:32
ultra runner of the
1:33
year you roy uh that ultra running magazine has put on but
1:36
that's very north
1:37
american centric and it's kind of limited not to worldwide
1:40
runners so the goal with
1:41
uh trail runner of the year is to kind of expand the field uh
1:45
and not make it only
1:46
SPEAKER_01: north american or ultra specific but basically any surface any distance
1:51
um with regards to trail running performances on racing
1:54
circuits so in a little bit
1:55
here i'm going to read out the guidelines for the voting uh as
1:59
we talk about it so
2:00
that let that kind of guide you um when you guys are trying to
2:03
make your decisions
2:04
SPEAKER_01: but for me i mean this is really one of the most exciting times because
2:08
um for you guys that listen to this podcast you're probably
2:10
pretty big into fantasy
2:11
free trail and you know that if you finish high enough in the
2:14
final fantasy free
2:15
trail rankings you get a weighted vote it's kind of similar to
2:18
what they do from my
2:19
understanding with the hall of fame for baseball um there is a
2:22
voting process and
2:23
SPEAKER_01: like baseball writers and people within the scene ex-coaches
2:27
and i think even players get a more weighted vote and so same
2:31
thing kind of applies
2:32
to trail runner of the year essentially they give weighted
2:35
votes to people who
2:37
finish really high in fantasy free trials kind of an incentive
2:39
to um to compete and
2:42
make good picks but also as a reward for having done good in
2:45
your picks throughout
2:46
the year so it's pretty exciting that they basically invite the
2:49
people who are kind
2:49
SPEAKER_01: of the biggest trail running fans trail running nerds have you
2:53
and uh give them a little bit more weight on their vote and so
2:57
i was lucky enough
2:58
this year to finish i want to say fifth overall i think travis
3:01
long car ended up
3:02
bumping me uh and i ended up falling from my second or third
3:05
place uh after worlds
3:07
down to fifth so still pretty squarely in the top 10 which i
3:10
was very excited about
3:11
SPEAKER_01: after just missing the top 10 last year uh pretty late in the season and
3:15
And so,
3:17
yeah,
3:17
so basically I'm lucky enough to be one of the people who gets
3:19
a weighted vote.
3:20
SPEAKER_01: And most other people at this point,
3:22
SPEAKER_01: if you got one,
3:23
SPEAKER_01: you got an email from pre-trial,
3:24
SPEAKER_01: I want to say.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, so that's kind of the intro trail runner of the year.
3:30
SPEAKER_01: It's what I get most excited about,
3:32
SPEAKER_01: not most excited about every year,
3:33
SPEAKER_01: but I mean,
3:34
SPEAKER_01: it's one of the things I get very excited about.
3:35
SPEAKER_01: And one of the big incentives for playing fantasy free trail is
3:38
And just it's kind of another cool way to show off your
3:40
knowledge and to make good
3:42
SPEAKER_01: picks and to pick good people throughout the world.
3:45
SPEAKER_01: So the goal is to not make it so North American centric,
3:48
not to make it so ultra focused to really celebrate all the
3:51
different trail running
3:51
SPEAKER_01: performances on both the sub ultra circuit,
3:54
SPEAKER_01: everything from World Mountain Running Association.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: That's like VKs and up down races that take anywhere from
4:00
30 minutes to maybe an hour and a half two hours to sky running
4:05
world series races
4:05
which can be anywhere from 20 kilometers to maybe 50 kilometers
4:09
and typically are
4:10
very vertical and technical terrain to you know your 50ks to
4:14
your golden trail
4:15
world series races which are usually around two hours and
4:18
usually anywhere from 25
4:19
SPEAKER_01: to 40k as well a little bit less vertical a little bit more fast
4:22
SPEAKER_01: To,
4:23
SPEAKER_01: you know,
4:23
SPEAKER_01: 50 milers,
4:24
SPEAKER_01: 100 Ks,
4:25
SPEAKER_01: 100 milers,
4:26
SPEAKER_01: and then we even get into longer distance races,
4:29
SPEAKER_01: like your Cocodonas,
4:30
SPEAKER_01: your Mammoth 200s,
4:32
SPEAKER_01: your Tour de Gion,
4:34
SPEAKER_01: and other performances like that,
4:36
SPEAKER_01: maybe even stage racing to an extent.
4:38
So the goal is to kind of celebrate all distances and really to
4:42
recognize and
4:44
SPEAKER_01: celebrate a range of results for these different distances.
4:50
SPEAKER_01: So with that being said,
4:53
SPEAKER_01: I'm recording this podcast on December 10th,
4:56
SPEAKER_01: Wednesday night in Colorado Springs.
4:58
And as I stand right now,
5:00
you guys still have five days and 16 hours left to make your
5:03
picks.
5:04
SPEAKER_01: So the picks close on December 16th, and it seems like it should be
5:10
the beginning of the no the end of the day on december 16th so
5:13
um essentially if
5:14
you're listening to this podcast i'm going to release it and
5:15
you'll have five days
5:16
left to make your picks you can swap around your picks as much
5:19
as you want just
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because you click submit it just saves the picks the voting is
5:23
not closed until uh
5:25
the time frame closes so you can move around your picks as much
5:28
as you want i like
5:29
to put in my picks and then kind of move them around and i'm
5:31
always going to give
5:32
you my picks with the caveat that i'm probably going to change
5:34
them and fiddle with
5:35
SPEAKER_01: some people and hear some other people's arguments so
5:38
SPEAKER_01: Anyways, that's enough.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: I think if you listen to this podcast,
5:40
SPEAKER_01: you're probably pretty performance with trail run of the year.
5:42
SPEAKER_01: But for anyone that wasn't, that's just kind of a quick primer.
5:45
SPEAKER_01: And so we're going to look at,
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we're going to talk about a bunch of different runners on both
5:49
the men's and the
5:50
SPEAKER_01: women's side.
5:51
SPEAKER_01: Some amazing performances.
5:53
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to mention every runner.
5:54
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to mention every runner that's in the voting.
5:56
SPEAKER_01: So there's 51 in the men's and the women's side.
5:58
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not going to mention every performance that every runner did,
6:00
SPEAKER_01: but I'm going to highlight what I think were the most densely competitive
6:03
SPEAKER_01: performances.
6:04
And what I think really for each runner,
6:06
I want to see at least two really big results.
6:09
SPEAKER_01: And we'll talk about that a little bit in the criteria for voting,
6:11
SPEAKER_01: which I'm about to read you guys.
6:13
SPEAKER_01: But I want to see really basically every runner's two best results.
6:15
SPEAKER_01: And then if they have more than that, I'm going to add them.
6:17
SPEAKER_01: But I'm going to pick the two that weigh the heaviest.
6:19
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't always necessarily mean it's going to be the highest UTMB index,
6:22
SPEAKER_01: although I'm going to use that as a consideration,
6:24
SPEAKER_01: but also just looking at the fields,
6:26
SPEAKER_01: who was in it,
6:27
SPEAKER_01: how deep was the field,
6:28
SPEAKER_01: how consistent was the racing,
6:29
SPEAKER_01: all kinds of things.
6:31
SPEAKER_01: So I've kind of gone on a little bit about this criteria.
6:33
SPEAKER_01: I think it's really important.
6:34
SPEAKER_01: I've included the criteria in the show notes,
6:36
as well as the links to the voting for both the trail runner of
6:39
the year and the
6:40
SPEAKER_01: trail performance of the year.
6:41
SPEAKER_01: I might record a separate podcast on trail performance,
6:43
SPEAKER_01: but I really want to get out this trail runner one first.
6:46
So trail runner of the year,
6:47
we're going to pick 10 deep on the men's and women's side.
6:50
SPEAKER_01: Trail performance of the year,
6:51
SPEAKER_01: we're going to pick five deep,
6:52
SPEAKER_01: and it's also close to December 16th.
6:54
SPEAKER_01: And so for the voting considerations,
6:55
I've included them in the show notes because I think it really
6:58
is important.
6:59
SPEAKER_01: And I think it's worth taking the time.
7:00
There's really kind of four big keys that Free Trail has
7:05
highlighted for those who do vote.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: And I really do encourage you guys to read them and weigh,
7:12
SPEAKER_01: when you're making your decisions,
7:13
SPEAKER_01: weigh each one of these categories.
7:15
SPEAKER_01: So those four voting considerations that they listed on the website,
7:20
SPEAKER_01: and I put the link in the show notes,
7:21
SPEAKER_01: They are talking about,
7:23
SPEAKER_01: so they said,
7:23
SPEAKER_01: for those who vote,
7:24
SPEAKER_01: we encourage you to take this person,
7:25
SPEAKER_01: this responsibility seriously,
7:27
SPEAKER_01: applying research and deep consideration to the ranking.
7:30
We hope you'll meditate on the following criteria before
7:32
submitting your ballot.
7:33
SPEAKER_01: The first criteria they said was depth of competition.
7:36
Reward those athletes who perform best on the biggest stages
7:39
against the deepest fields.
7:40
So sometimes a second,
7:41
third or fourth,
7:43
second through fifth can be just as impressive as a win.
7:46
If we're talking about races like any of your UTMB majors,
7:49
any of the world's races this year,
7:52
SPEAKER_01: Or even,
7:53
SPEAKER_01: yeah,
7:54
that's kind of the big stuff compared to races that were maybe
7:56
only a handful deep.
7:57
SPEAKER_01: So depth of competition,
7:59
SPEAKER_01: that's one that I'm really going to harp on and that you guys might,
8:03
SPEAKER_01: like I might be picking people that don't have as many wins,
8:05
SPEAKER_01: but they had really consistent results in the deepest fields in the year.
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SPEAKER_01: Second one is consistency of performance.
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SPEAKER_01: So that goes hand in hand.
8:11
SPEAKER_01: Maybe they knocked the ball out of the park and won one big race,
8:13
SPEAKER_01: but didn't have another big performance.
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SPEAKER_01: So consistency of performance.
8:17
Consider the whole season in context and reward those athletes
8:19
who raced well
8:20
SPEAKER_01: consistently while weighing outstanding single performances accordingly.
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So there's a handful of athletes that have really good results
8:27
and won really big races.
8:29
SPEAKER_01: but they only won one big race.
8:30
SPEAKER_01: And I'll talk about that on both the men's and the women's side.
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SPEAKER_01: If they didn't have a second big result,
8:35
it's tough for me to pick them no matter how outstanding the
8:38
one result was.
8:40
SPEAKER_01: And there's a handful of people that I think could easily be on.
8:43
I think even one person that could easily win if she just had
8:46
one more result,
8:46
but the consistency of performance is big because we want to
8:49
see you compete
8:50
SPEAKER_01: against in a variety of races against her.
8:53
It could be a range of distances,
8:54
but really just consistency throughout the year.
8:56
SPEAKER_01: Third category is going to be versatility of performance.
9:00
SPEAKER_01: As mentioned, Troy is distance agnostic.
9:03
SPEAKER_01: As such,
9:03
consider and reward athletes who display ability to compete
9:06
across distances and
9:07
SPEAKER_01: terrain variations.
9:08
SPEAKER_01: So not only do we want to see consistency,
9:10
but if you went from podiuming at a Golden Trail World Series
9:15
event to podiuming or
9:17
SPEAKER_01: going top five at the World's Long Trail,
9:19
SPEAKER_01: that's pretty good consistency performance.
9:21
SPEAKER_01: Likewise with going from sub-ultra to UTMB or ultra distances.
9:24
SPEAKER_01: So that's going to be a big one too.
9:26
SPEAKER_01: And we'll talk about that.
9:26
That's going to really kind of tilted the scale in favor for my
9:30
woman's pick of the year.
9:31
SPEAKER_01: Geographical bias.
9:32
SPEAKER_01: So free trail has an international audience,
9:34
SPEAKER_01: but we are North American based in English speaking.
9:36
We hope the voters will have advanced level knowledge of the
9:38
international dynamics
9:39
SPEAKER_01: in the sport,
9:40
including which races are significant across the myriad of
9:43
international event
9:44
SPEAKER_01: series.
9:44
SPEAKER_01: So they put world mountain running association,
9:47
SPEAKER_01: golden trail series,
9:47
SPEAKER_01: UTMB,
9:48
SPEAKER_01: golden tickets,
9:48
SPEAKER_01: sky running,
9:49
SPEAKER_01: et cetera.
9:49
SPEAKER_01: So that's
9:50
kind of what i talked about uh earlier in this podcast i said
9:53
hey they're gonna
9:53
look at a range of performances i hope if if you've listened to
9:56
this podcast at all
9:57
this year and if it's done nothing else i hope it's made you a
10:00
fan of some trail
10:01
runners that you didn't know previously whether they were you
10:04
know international
10:04
trail runners or they raced on circuits that you weren't
10:07
familiar with or didn't
10:08
follow that's kind of the goal of the show is to give you a
10:11
nuanced view and really
10:12
SPEAKER_01: to highlight performances that we might not always see
10:15
Obviously I'm a North American based podcaster and I mostly do
10:20
North American based
10:20
SPEAKER_01: racing,
10:21
SPEAKER_01: but I really,
10:22
SPEAKER_01: really try to,
10:23
to understand the races that are going on in Europe and to have
10:26
a good feel for
10:27
SPEAKER_01: them and to research the results,
10:30
SPEAKER_01: to look at the fields.
10:31
SPEAKER_01: And I feel like I do a decent job at that.
10:34
SPEAKER_01: But I,
10:35
SPEAKER_01: And I also don't feel like I'm too North American centric,
10:37
SPEAKER_01: but obviously I could be incorrect about that.
10:39
SPEAKER_01: But I really try to bring nuance to it.
10:41
I know most of my listeners are going to be US based,
10:43
I think about two thirds to three fourths.
10:45
SPEAKER_01: But I do have a handful of Canadian and European,
10:48
SPEAKER_01: and I hope I do a good job of really highlighting those other athletes.
10:50
Eventually,
10:51
I would like to do a better job of highlighting Asian athletes
10:53
as well.
10:54
SPEAKER_01: I think I have a hard time.
10:55
determining which races are really competitive and with some of
10:58
the chinese runners
10:59
they race so much that it's tough to determine which races are
11:02
really significant
11:02
and which are not when they have so many results um so that's
11:06
one thing that i
11:06
think is a blind spot on my part and i'd like to have a better
11:08
way to discern it um
11:10
right now the only way i kind of know is when they come over
11:12
and race western races
11:13
like geo sheng shen from china coming over and racing and doing
11:17
well at western
11:18
SPEAKER_01: states and a
11:21
SPEAKER_01: Those are the criteria.
11:23
SPEAKER_01: Once again,
11:23
SPEAKER_01: depth of competition,
11:24
SPEAKER_01: consistency of performance,
11:26
SPEAKER_01: versatility of performance,
11:27
SPEAKER_01: and geographical bias.
11:29
SPEAKER_01: So I'm going to really be focusing on the first three.
11:32
SPEAKER_01: And then geographical bias, I'm going to try to also take a nuanced view.
11:36
SPEAKER_01: As of right now, my picks are looking pretty nuanced.
11:40
SPEAKER_01: I feel like they're not too North American-centric.
11:44
SPEAKER_01: From what I have right now,
11:45
I've only got one American on the women's side and then three
11:48
Americans on the
11:48
SPEAKER_01: men's side and one of them's kind of not even American.
11:51
SPEAKER_01: But we'll see.
11:52
SPEAKER_01: So anyways, that is a long, long preamble.
11:55
SPEAKER_01: We're going to finally get to talking about some of these runners.
11:58
I am going to go with the men's side first just because I have
12:02
the notes on them first.
12:03
SPEAKER_01: But I really think this women's side honestly was harder for me to pick.
12:06
SPEAKER_01: The men's was a little bit more clear, I'd say, in the top five.
12:08
the women's it felt like there was a ton of people that had
12:11
really similar awesome
12:12
seasons and it was tough to kind of weigh them and judge them
12:15
so i'm going to talk
12:16
about each one of these athletes i'm going to highlight some of
12:18
their really key
12:19
results and biggest results of the year usually going to focus
12:22
on at least two but
12:23
occasionally more if they had a couple really big wins and uh
12:26
and sometimes i
12:27
couldn't really weigh which one was exactly more competitive um
12:30
but maybe they were
12:31
both really big races and maybe three wins is really impressive
12:34
or four wins and
12:35
SPEAKER_01: So we'll talk about the big results and then I'll give you a tentative,
12:37
SPEAKER_01: my tentative top 10 with the caveat that it's always subject to change.
12:41
So without further ado,
12:42
let's get into the men's field now that we've talked about
12:44
that.
12:45
SPEAKER_01: These are going in alphabetical order.
12:47
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to go through all 51 on each side,
12:49
but I'm going to highlight the big ones that I think are in
12:51
competition and should
12:52
SPEAKER_01: be considered for your top 10 and highlight their key results.
12:55
SPEAKER_01: So on the men's side, we're going to start off with
12:58
SPEAKER_01: Ben Demon.
12:59
SPEAKER_01: So Ben Demon,
13:00
SPEAKER_01: the American living in France,
13:02
SPEAKER_01: excuse me,
13:03
SPEAKER_01: A6 runner,
13:05
SPEAKER_01: really only raced three times this year,
13:07
SPEAKER_01: but had three stellar results.
13:08
SPEAKER_01: He won UTMB Vontu against Baptiste Chassain and...
13:14
I want to say Thibaut Gravier,
13:15
one other runner,
13:16
but won that to start off the year.
13:19
And then he went,
13:19
rolled into a win and a course record at the Lauderdale,
13:22
120K.
13:22
SPEAKER_01: We've seen tons of really good runners come through there.
13:25
SPEAKER_01: He raced a good field and had a really good result.
13:27
SPEAKER_01: And then he got a second at UTMB to Tom Evans,
13:30
SPEAKER_01: albeit UTMB did not feel like it was the deepest field in the
13:35
the uh compared to previous years this year um and i think
13:40
travis long car his uh
13:42
index with regards to uh his analytics dashboard on the fantasy
13:47
free trial website
13:47
kind of backs that up um it looked like occ was the deepest
13:51
race when we're looking
13:52
at mean and also standard deviation uh with regards to the utmb
13:57
races this year
13:57
SPEAKER_01: based off the analytics that he had
13:59
But nonetheless,
14:01
getting second place at UTMB is getting second place at UTMB.
14:04
SPEAKER_01: That's not to take anything away from Ben.
14:06
And it was a killer result in a race that he's been trying to
14:09
nail for a couple of years now.
14:10
SPEAKER_01: So that was really, really cool to see.
14:13
SPEAKER_01: I'm looking at the UTMB index.
14:15
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, top, let's see, top 50, top 25.
14:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, UTMB was the second deepest behind CCC on the men's side.
14:27
SPEAKER_01: No, excuse me, behind OCC on the men's side.
14:29
SPEAKER_01: So it was a little bit deeper than CCC, but not quite as deep as OCC.
14:35
SPEAKER_01: Excuse me.
14:35
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was deeper than CCC, not quite as deep as OCC.
14:39
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, with regards to mean.
14:43
SPEAKER_01: So for the top 25 runners is what I'm looking at anyways.
14:46
so that's been demon to start um so not a ton of results but i
14:49
mean honestly
14:50
everything he did i would say his lavarado and his unb were the
14:54
heaviest and i
14:54
think that's going to weigh heavy i think he had a really good
14:56
year in my opinion
14:57
SPEAKER_01: should definitely be a strong considerate for your top 10.
15:00
uh andrew blanes rig spanish runner for hoka speedster uh tried
15:05
to go olympian
15:06
SPEAKER_01: steeplechase and just missed the cut on spain's side
15:08
SPEAKER_01: He had a killer year.
15:09
SPEAKER_01: He went second at Zagama in a super stacked field.
15:11
SPEAKER_01: He led for over half of it until LZ made a move.
15:14
SPEAKER_01: Eighth at Sierra Zanal and a very, very fast 235.
15:17
And he got third at Worlds to go with his dominant win at
15:20
Kodiak 50k to end the season.
15:21
He also won the Spanish short trail champs qualifying race at
15:24
the beginning of the year.
15:25
SPEAKER_01: Two strongest results, in my opinion.
15:26
SPEAKER_01: Second at Zagama, third at Worlds.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: But eight at Sierra Zanal and a win at Kodiak, not too bad.
15:33
Next runner is going to be Caleb Olson,
15:35
Nike's own and Salt Lake's very own Caleb Olson.
15:39
Started off the year with a winning course record at
15:41
Trans-Grand Canaria over a
15:42
SPEAKER_01: very talented and hard-to-beat John Albin and then Josh Wade.
15:46
His biggest result of the year by far was his winning nearly
15:49
course record over a
15:50
SPEAKER_01: super stacked field in Western States on a very hot day.
15:53
And then he won the Grampian Peaks 100 to end the season,
15:55
but probably not in the deepest field.
15:57
it's unfortunate that caleb dnf that worlds because i really
15:59
wanted to see how he
16:00
stacked up compared to jim and honestly if he took the world's
16:03
long trail or even
16:04
got second i don't know i think whoever won that was going to
16:07
get um was going to
16:09
get trail run of the year in my opinion whether it was
16:12
francesco whether it was jim
16:13
or whether it was caleb it's unfortunately caleb dnf'd but i
16:16
really wanted to see
16:16
him go head to head with jim don't know that he would have beat
16:18
him but it would
16:19
SPEAKER_01: have been cool to see them duke it out so
16:22
Next runner is Dan Jones,
16:24
a Kiwi runner for Adidas Terex,
16:26
three-peat winner at Terawera.
16:28
SPEAKER_01: So he smoked Terawera and won in a good field.
16:31
SPEAKER_01: He had to win at Lake Sonoma Marathon and UTA 50K.
16:34
SPEAKER_01: UTA 50K was the Oceania major for UTMB.
16:37
And then his fifth at Western States was probably his best
16:40
result out of all those.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: He's kind of similar to Ruth Croft, who we'll talk a little bit about.
16:45
SPEAKER_01: His Western result was probably his best one, along with his Terawera.
16:49
SPEAKER_01: But...
16:52
SPEAKER_01: And then UTA was good as well.
16:54
SPEAKER_01: And I don't know that he's quite there in my top 10.
16:58
SPEAKER_01: So next athlete is going to be David Sinclair.
17:01
SPEAKER_01: The U.S.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: ultra runner for Kraft really made a stamp on the international.
17:06
SPEAKER_01: This scene was second place in his debut CCC.
17:09
This was a really big year of racing for him now that he's got
17:12
sponsorship and good
17:14
SPEAKER_01: support from a brand.
17:16
SPEAKER_01: So,
17:17
SPEAKER_01: uh,
17:18
SPEAKER_01: looking at his year,
17:18
SPEAKER_01: he started off with a DNF at Transvalconia and terrible weather,
17:22
SPEAKER_01: but he bounced back for top five at Broken Arrow Ascent.
17:24
SPEAKER_01: And he went second at the Broken Arrow 46K, which is a U.S.
17:28
Trail Champs qualifier,
17:29
just behind Eli Hemming and under his previous course record.
17:32
SPEAKER_01: Uh,
17:32
SPEAKER_01: he won the Loon Mountain race and then,
17:35
SPEAKER_01: but by far,
17:35
SPEAKER_01: like I said,
17:35
SPEAKER_01: his biggest performances of the year,
17:37
second place at CCC to Francesco Pupi and is really his
17:40
international racing debut.
17:42
And then second place at JFK,
17:45
just behind Hans Schroer,
17:46
a little bit off of his course record.
17:50
SPEAKER_01: So I think second at BA,
17:52
SPEAKER_01: 46K,
17:53
SPEAKER_01: second at CCC,
17:54
SPEAKER_01: and second at JFK were all really good results for David Sinclair.
17:59
Next one is going to be a Davide Magnini,
18:02
the Italian sub-ultra running champion and GOAT.
18:07
He really had a big bounce back here after what seems like a
18:09
couple years of injury for him.
18:11
SPEAKER_01: He had a win at Marathon to Mont Blanc,
18:13
SPEAKER_01: not the first time he's won the event,
18:14
SPEAKER_01: over a really good field that included
18:16
SPEAKER_01: Tomal Cardin, Ezekiel Rudo, Petr Engdahl.
18:21
And then he also won Giro de Mont in a very fast time over some
18:24
other talented
18:25
SPEAKER_01: runners,
18:25
SPEAKER_01: Stian Angerman,
18:26
SPEAKER_01: Paul Monchoka,
18:27
SPEAKER_01: Lorenzo Roto,
18:28
SPEAKER_01: Kevin Cabette.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: So those are probably his two best results.
18:31
SPEAKER_01: He also ran to an eighth place at Worlds in the short trail.
18:36
SPEAKER_01: So really big bounce back year for Davide Magnini.
18:39
SPEAKER_01: Big fan of his.
18:40
He has a huge ceiling and it's good to see him racing to his
18:44
potential again.
18:45
Next runner is going to be the back-to-back Golden Trail World
18:49
Series champion.
18:50
SPEAKER_01: He hit the nail on the head again.
18:51
SPEAKER_01: That's Mr. Elozine Elozowie running for normal.
18:55
SPEAKER_01: The flying camel, as they call him, from Morocco.
18:58
SPEAKER_01: Really just another dominant season from him.
19:00
SPEAKER_01: Not quite as dominant as last year,
19:02
where I think we saw him go undefeated on the Golden Trail
19:05
Series circuit.
19:07
but except for maybe his tears and all he didn't race well
19:09
there if he raced there
19:11
um he started the season with a win at chianti half marathon
19:15
second place in a
19:17
tight race at goal golf lodea solo so gts noly and then he
19:21
bounced back for his
19:22
biggest performance of the year probably in my opinion was his
19:24
win at zagama after
19:26
a bunch of second place finishes um winning by over seven
19:29
minutes over andrew
19:30
SPEAKER_01: blanes in a very speedy time
19:33
He followed that up with two more wins at the very competitive
19:36
Broken Arrow 23K,
19:37
SPEAKER_01: which was another Golden Trail,
19:38
SPEAKER_01: and then the Tepic Trail 34K in Mexico,
19:40
SPEAKER_01: which was a little bit less competitive.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: Most impressively,
19:43
SPEAKER_01: he ran his best race at Sears in all yet,
19:45
SPEAKER_01: 235 for ninth place,
19:47
and then he finished winning the Golden Trail World Series
19:49
final and prologue.
19:50
SPEAKER_01: I think he's got to be top five,
19:53
if not top three in your picks after winning trail runner of
19:56
the year last year.
19:56
SPEAKER_01: I don't think he's going to quite get that trail runner year repeat,
20:00
SPEAKER_01: but I think he's got to be your top five.
20:01
SPEAKER_01: He's just such a good racer, such a smart racer.
20:04
SPEAKER_01: And he always races some of the deepest fields.
20:06
SPEAKER_01: I think his Zagamo one was amazing.
20:08
SPEAKER_01: And then,
20:09
SPEAKER_01: I think having three or four wins on the Golden Trail Series circuit,
20:12
including winning the final yet again in the prologue and just
20:15
kind of clean
20:15
SPEAKER_01: sleeping it.
20:16
SPEAKER_01: Definitely an awesome job on Elzean's part.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: I hope we kind of get him into more of the 50K stuff next year.
20:20
I think he was popping up on some 50K list for a little bit and
20:25
maybe even like an
20:26
SPEAKER_01: OCC or something,
20:27
SPEAKER_01: if I remember correctly.
20:27
SPEAKER_01: So it'd be great to see him there.
20:30
SPEAKER_01: Next runner in a very legitimate contender should be in your top 10.
20:34
Possibly even your top five is going to be Francesco Pupi,
20:38
the trail athlete for Hoka.
20:41
SPEAKER_01: He always says, we are so back.
20:43
SPEAKER_01: And I think he was so back, but it's like he never left, honestly.
20:47
Started off this year on a streak with wins at Trans Grand
20:50
Canary Marathon in a
20:51
SPEAKER_01: battle with Robert Kamoye.
20:53
uh chianti marathon pretty decisively canyons 100k he was
20:57
dominant over the golden
20:58
ticket field in the states won lavarado 50k for his second
21:02
straight year and then
21:03
ended that streak with a 10th place but a great race at zeroes
21:06
and all his first uh
21:07
good one in a couple years then bounced back to win at ccc uh
21:12
which was amazing to
21:13
SPEAKER_01: see him step up to that 100k distance and dominate in that way
21:17
SPEAKER_01: And then he did the quick turnaround to worlds.
21:19
SPEAKER_01: Yo-yoed a ton.
21:20
SPEAKER_01: I think he was doing really bad on the downhills, if I want to say.
21:25
SPEAKER_01: And it basically ended up going from like 40th to finishing ninth.
21:28
So still a top 10 at worlds long trail,
21:30
despite it not being his best day.
21:32
Like I said,
21:33
I think he's got to be in your top five minimum,
21:34
maybe even top three.
21:37
SPEAKER_01: The only thing that I said was the men's field at CCC was,
21:42
was per the top 25 UTMB mean score for the top 25 runners was
21:51
the lowest of the three fields.
21:53
SPEAKER_01: And it did feel like OCC was the deepest race in this field this year.
22:00
SPEAKER_01: And even the top 50 as well, it was the lowest mean UTMB index as well.
22:04
I mean,
22:04
these are still really high UTMB indexes,
22:05
but it just felt like fewer people did...
22:09
SPEAKER_01: CCC because they were more so dropping down to OCC for Worlds.
22:14
SPEAKER_01: So that's Francesco Pippi.
22:15
SPEAKER_01: Great year for the trail athlete for Hoka.
22:19
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be Hans Troyer.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: Wins at Way Too Cool 50K.
22:23
SPEAKER_01: So that's a North American 50K.
22:25
Second at Cane's 100K to Francesco,
22:27
which was a really amazing performance.
22:29
SPEAKER_01: Eighth at his Western States debut.
22:30
And then a win in just under the course record at JFK just a
22:34
few weeks ago.
22:34
SPEAKER_01: And beating the returning champ David Sinclair.
22:38
It's awesome to see how great his season was and it's tough not
22:41
to include him.
22:43
But I'm also trying to weigh the really strong Europe
22:45
performances with his good
22:46
SPEAKER_01: domestic performances.
22:48
SPEAKER_01: I think his best result is probably his second night cannons.
22:50
SPEAKER_01: His eighth at Western was really awesome.
22:53
but it wasn't anything that would probably have him put me in
22:56
the top 10.
22:57
SPEAKER_01: And his JFK win was really good and decisive,
23:01
SPEAKER_01: and it wasn't a historically fast time,
23:02
SPEAKER_01: but it's hard to weigh it when the other fields aren't quite as deep
23:07
SPEAKER_01: internationally minus Western,
23:08
SPEAKER_01: which was his still amazing result,
23:11
SPEAKER_01: but it wasn't the best out of all his results.
23:15
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Mr. Jim Him-Walmsley.
23:20
uh he won everything that he raced this year most notably he
23:23
won chianti over
23:24
killian and vincent decisive vincent bouillard decisively uh
23:28
what 30 minutes i want
23:29
to say um he won occ over a stupid deep field using it as a
23:34
rate a tune-up for
23:35
worlds and then he won the world long trail in a decisive and
23:38
impressive fashion
23:39
and i think it was also the highest uh interest score ever if
23:45
i'm not mistaken um
23:48
Don't quote me on that,
23:48
but I think it was along with Tove's performance.
23:52
SPEAKER_01: He's got to be the frontrunner for Trailrunner of the Year in my mind.
23:54
SPEAKER_01: I think that he had a good range of wins.
23:58
SPEAKER_01: I think he had multiple wins.
23:59
SPEAKER_01: I think he had wins in super deep fields.
24:02
SPEAKER_01: And I just think that I'd be hard-pressed to find...
24:06
somebody who has a better argument for trail runner of the year
24:09
i could be
24:09
persuaded otherwise i'd love to hear your guys feedback tell me
24:11
why i'm wrong um i
24:12
think it was kind of between him and caleb olsen but then and
24:16
maybe and even
24:17
francesco poopy as well i think if any three of them had won
24:21
worlds i would have
24:22
them as my trail runner of the year but because jim did uh he
24:26
won head-to-head with
24:27
SPEAKER_01: fran even though fran was bouncing back from ccc and
24:32
SPEAKER_01: even though Caleb dropped out because he banged up his knee.
24:34
SPEAKER_01: I think that his wins in all these races are the most impressive.
24:38
SPEAKER_01: So when at OCC and when at Worlds alone,
24:41
SPEAKER_01: where his two deepest,
24:42
SPEAKER_01: and then Chianti isn't typically a deep race,
24:44
SPEAKER_01: but it did have Vincent Bouillard,
24:48
SPEAKER_01: so the returning UTMB champion,
24:49
SPEAKER_01: Killian Jornet,
24:50
SPEAKER_01: the GOAT,
24:51
SPEAKER_01: and it also had Andreas Ryder,
24:52
SPEAKER_01: who's a great runner.
24:53
He ended up being nothing,
24:54
but basically Jem just beat everyone decisively.
24:58
SPEAKER_01: So pretty impressive.
24:59
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be this year's UTMB champion in his third time,
25:04
SPEAKER_01: the third time's a charm,
25:05
SPEAKER_01: Mr.
25:05
SPEAKER_01: Tom Evans.
25:06
He won in a dominant fashion and super impressive time at this
25:09
year's UTMB after
25:11
SPEAKER_01: back-to-back DNFs.
25:13
SPEAKER_01: Like I said,
25:13
SPEAKER_01: I didn't feel like UTMB was the deepest field compared to previous years,
25:17
SPEAKER_01: and I think the analytics kind of back that up.
25:20
It does appear slightly deeper than CCC in the men's field
25:24
based off the top 25 mean and...
25:29
uh even the top 50 uh mean score as well um but i don't know
25:34
maybe it's just
25:35
because i got really caught up in the world type or maybe it's
25:37
because yeah i don't
25:40
know it just feels like it wasn't anecdotally it doesn't feel
25:42
like it was as deep
25:44
as previous years especially with worlds uh being this year um
25:49
tom evans's utmb was
25:50
amazing his time was amazing slightly altered course so tough
25:53
to tell but it
25:54
definitely would have been historically fast time regardless if
25:56
it was the
25:58
The only thing that I hesitate with Tom is I don't feel like he
26:02
had the depth of
26:04
SPEAKER_01: competition and consistency of performance,
26:06
choosing to only really race one truly deeper competitive race
26:10
because he won
26:11
SPEAKER_01: Archipatrician at the beginning of the year,
26:12
SPEAKER_01: but that's kind of just a regionally competitive race.
26:14
SPEAKER_01: There wasn't a lot of huge names.
26:16
SPEAKER_01: And then he also won the...
26:19
110k tenor reef and utmb but it was not a deep field so um he
26:23
raced smart to get
26:24
him ready for utmb but he didn't have another performance to go
26:26
with utmb and for
26:28
that reason i don't have him in my top 10 quite frankly so and
26:31
we'll talk about
26:32
SPEAKER_01: that with a with some other runners as well
26:34
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Remy Benet,
26:37
SPEAKER_01: the Swiss Rocket,
26:38
who spent most of the season injured coming off of opening a
26:42
Golden Trail Series
26:43
SPEAKER_01: Noly event,
26:43
SPEAKER_01: where I thought he got injured there,
26:46
SPEAKER_01: but I think he might have got injured shortly after.
26:47
SPEAKER_01: He bounced back to race some really amazing uphill races.
26:50
SPEAKER_01: He won Nerevu Mollesen, which is a Swiss race uphill that he always does.
26:55
SPEAKER_01: I believe he did it in the second fastest time ever.
26:57
SPEAKER_01: I think he was like 56.05.
26:59
SPEAKER_01: And his course record is like 55-40 or 55-30.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: So he was in obviously really good shape if he's running that fast there.
27:06
SPEAKER_01: And then he followed that up with a dominant win at World's Uphill Race.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: He smoked everybody.
27:10
SPEAKER_01: It was so impressive to see.
27:12
And then he followed that up with a world record for the VK in
27:15
La Fouli for like in
27:17
SPEAKER_01: like over a minute and a half.
27:18
SPEAKER_01: I want to say he went...
27:20
27 low and i think the record was 28 50 by killian so i mean he
27:25
smashed it it was
27:26
nuts he even broke it when he just was doing a training run
27:28
going up it but then he
27:29
doubled back to do the event when everyone was like cheering
27:32
him on and stuff and
27:32
he just it's crazy i definitely think that bk is up for
27:36
discussion for trail
27:36
SPEAKER_01: performance a year but remy doesn't have unfortunately the versatility of
27:40
performances because he was limited to just uphill stuff but it
27:43
really was draw
27:44
SPEAKER_01: dropping to see how
27:47
easily he won the world uphill champs and then also just that
27:50
vk is is nuts to
27:51
think of so we always know remy's one of the best climbers in
27:53
the world and that
27:54
just kind of reaffirmed it i wish we could have got him in more
27:57
races uh with up
27:58
and down um if he had been healthier this year so so next
28:03
athlete uh this one uh
28:06
SPEAKER_01: really broke
28:08
out and I think had a breakout year I'm going to say about a
28:11
lot of these runners
28:11
this year but I think this guy really kind of leveled up from
28:13
getting a ton of
28:14
SPEAKER_01: second places last year and that's going to be Mr.
28:16
SPEAKER_01: Philemon Kiriago so runner for uh
28:22
for on and i'm blanking on the the group that he runs with um
28:27
good together i want
28:28
to say it is and philemon he just really stepped it up he had a
28:31
lot more wins this
28:32
year he also had wins at really iconic world bout running races
28:36
it's tough to judge
28:36
some of these especially the kenyan athletes or anyone that
28:39
runs a lot of wmra
28:40
SPEAKER_01: events because they have such a range and the fields are so stacked
28:43
And it's tough to almost impossible to like win every single
28:46
one of these events.
28:47
SPEAKER_01: So when you just see a bunch of one through five,
28:50
you really have to dig in these fields and see how dense they
28:52
are and see how
28:53
frequently these guys are racing and also historically how good
28:55
the times are.
28:56
Philemon had a ton of races this year and he had a ton of great
28:58
performances.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: It's hard to rate them all, but the key ones, so he had wins at,
29:04
SPEAKER_01: Golden Trail World Series, Noli.
29:06
SPEAKER_01: He won at Trophy of Nusego,
29:08
which is a really important classic WMRA event in Italy with a
29:11
really deep field.
29:12
SPEAKER_01: He won in Theon Dixens,
29:14
SPEAKER_01: which I'm sure I'm pronouncing that wrong in Switzerland,
29:16
SPEAKER_01: but that is also a historically super fast and super deep field.
29:20
SPEAKER_01: He won Sierras in all.
29:21
That's probably his biggest one of the year in 228,
29:23
super fast historically time.
29:25
SPEAKER_01: And it was a super deep field as it always is.
29:28
Smarna Gora,
29:29
which is in Slovenia and is a historically significant race on
29:33
the WMRA circuit.
29:34
SPEAKER_01: And then he also won the world champs classic race.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: So two biggest wins by far.
29:38
SPEAKER_01: We're going to be a Sears and all in his world champs.
29:40
If we were talking about anyone that is not named filament or
29:43
anyone that maybe was
29:45
SPEAKER_01: European or North American,
29:48
SPEAKER_01: This would be,
29:48
SPEAKER_01: those two results alone would get you a really strong top three,
29:52
SPEAKER_01: if not top five.
29:54
But when you combine that with all these other wins that he had
29:56
at classic iconic races,
29:58
crazy.
29:58
SPEAKER_01: And those were just his wins.
29:59
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
30:00
SPEAKER_01: he had second place at three different Golden Trail series,
30:03
SPEAKER_01: Kobe,
30:04
SPEAKER_01: Great Wall,
30:04
SPEAKER_01: and Broken Arrow,
30:05
SPEAKER_01: 23K.
30:05
SPEAKER_01: He had second at Vertical in the Sago,
30:08
SPEAKER_01: second at the Vauban Mountain Trail French Selection Champs,
30:12
SPEAKER_01: which was super stacked.
30:13
uh giro de mont uphill so you get an insane schedule he's got
30:17
to be in your top
30:18
five guys i'm really emphasizing that because his results are
30:21
nuts and um there's
30:22
even more good ones that i didn't mention he ended up finishing
30:25
third overall in
30:26
the golden trail series final standings but his sierras and all
30:30
his world champs
30:31
SPEAKER_01: classic race and then uh his
30:35
SPEAKER_01: Yes,
30:35
here's an all-world champs classic race and then multiple wins
30:39
at WMRA and Golden
30:40
SPEAKER_01: Trail Series events.
30:41
SPEAKER_01: I really think he's got to be up there.
30:42
SPEAKER_01: And I honestly think he's got to be above Patrick,
30:44
even though Patrick finished higher than him in the Golden
30:46
Trail Series standings.
30:47
SPEAKER_01: I think Philemon had wins in deeper races and iconic races and in really
30:53
SPEAKER_01: historically fast times.
30:54
SPEAKER_01: So that is my pitch for Philemon Kiriago.
30:56
SPEAKER_01: If you're not voting him in your top 10, you are missing out.
31:00
SPEAKER_01: And I strongly disagree with you.
31:02
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be the Norwegian,
31:04
SPEAKER_01: or excuse me,
31:05
SPEAKER_01: he's Swedish,
31:05
SPEAKER_01: but he lives in Norway,
31:07
SPEAKER_01: Petter Engdahl.
31:08
SPEAKER_01: Really good year from Petter after an up and down last year,
31:11
SPEAKER_01: dealing with some injuries and other stuff.
31:13
No crazy wins like his CCC in past years where he set a course
31:16
record in 2022.
31:17
And that ended up getting him seventh place for trail run of
31:21
the year voting in 2022.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: This year, he raced Marathon of Montblanc to eighth place.
31:25
SPEAKER_01: He raced OCC to a great race in a super deep field.
31:28
He went fourth overall there in a one through seven that was
31:31
only separated by seven minutes.
31:33
SPEAKER_01: So really tight one through seven on OCC.
31:36
SPEAKER_01: He also went to sixth at the World's Long Trail.
31:38
He was up there with Jim for a lot of it,
31:39
and he was only two minutes off of fifth place.
31:41
SPEAKER_01: He had wins at other smaller and less dense races.
31:43
SPEAKER_01: Definitely his best races.
31:45
SPEAKER_01: Had to be fourth at OCC and sixth at Worlds.
31:48
SPEAKER_01: So a great year for him.
31:49
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if he's quite going to make it in my top 10,
31:52
SPEAKER_01: but just a really good bounce back year for Petter.
31:55
SPEAKER_01: After Petter,
31:55
SPEAKER_01: we have Peter,
31:56
SPEAKER_01: which is going to be Peter Frano,
31:58
SPEAKER_01: the young Slovakian athlete for...
32:03
SPEAKER_01: Excuse me, I've scrolled.
32:04
SPEAKER_01: For Skarka, huge range of versatility.
32:06
Started off the year with a win at Transvalconia in horrendous
32:09
hypothermia-inducing
32:10
SPEAKER_01: weather conditions with only a t-shirt in a historically fast time.
32:14
SPEAKER_01: So it won at TBC,
32:16
SPEAKER_01: followed it up with a ninth place at his debut Western States,
32:19
SPEAKER_01: and then a fifth at the World's Long Trail Race and a win at the GPT 50K.
32:24
SPEAKER_01: He was signed up to race UTCT,
32:26
SPEAKER_01: and he didn't end up racing it or he dropped down to a shorter distance.
32:29
SPEAKER_01: If he won UTCT, I really think he should be in your top 10.
32:33
SPEAKER_01: combined with his Trans-Valconia Western and Worlds.
32:36
Right now,
32:37
I think his two strongest results are Fit That Worlds and win
32:39
at TBC.
32:42
And I don't know if that's quite enough to get in the top 10,
32:44
but really a good shout out.
32:45
SPEAKER_01: If he had won UTCT,
32:46
I think he definitely would have been out there because he's
32:48
really run some really
32:49
SPEAKER_01: good races this year.
32:51
SPEAKER_01: Next one's going to be Kenyan Paul Machoco.
32:53
SPEAKER_01: I think he's running for normal these days, but don't quote me on that.
32:57
Podium performances at Trofeo Nisego,
33:00
World Championships Classic Distance.
33:04
uh golden trail series like golfer de la solo um at the final
33:09
sky trentino he also
33:10
went top five at sierras and all is year to mont french vk
33:13
championships in a few
33:14
other races he's got a ton of really strong results and he's
33:17
consistent but the no
33:18
big wins to punch him above and above above and beyond some of
33:21
the other similar
33:23
SPEAKER_01: kenyan runners like patrick and philemon um with a lot of results so
33:27
SPEAKER_01: It's crazy because it's tough because he has so many good results.
33:31
But when you have people winning both ultras and then people
33:34
performing slightly
33:35
SPEAKER_01: better in the sub ultra than him,
33:37
SPEAKER_01: it's tough.
33:37
SPEAKER_01: But he's raced a ton of races and has a ton of really good results here.
33:41
SPEAKER_01: Next one is going to be Boulder Boys, very own Seth Ruling.
33:43
SPEAKER_01: He had a win at Black Canyon, 100K in the course record.
33:47
SPEAKER_01: Went at Canyon's 50K in a good field.
33:49
SPEAKER_01: Six at Western States in his debut,
33:52
SPEAKER_01: going under 15 hours,
33:53
SPEAKER_01: and then ended the year with the 32nd at Worlds,
33:56
SPEAKER_01: which is a little bit disappointing for him.
33:58
SPEAKER_01: If he had a better result,
33:59
SPEAKER_01: like a top five or 10 at Worlds,
34:01
SPEAKER_01: I think he'd safely be in my top 10.
34:03
SPEAKER_01: He did have an amazing year,
34:04
SPEAKER_01: but his best results were kind of Black Canyon,
34:07
SPEAKER_01: 100K,
34:07
SPEAKER_01: a little bit more domestic field.
34:09
SPEAKER_01: Canyon's 50K, a little bit more domestic field.
34:11
SPEAKER_01: Sixth out Western was really awesome and was an international field.
34:14
SPEAKER_01: I'd like to see one other, I guess, more so international result.
34:18
um black canyon was really impressive and that is a very deep
34:21
domestic field um so
34:23
that's kind of where i'm at uh all right there's so many guys
34:27
to get through
34:29
SPEAKER_01: All right, we're coming up.
34:29
We've only got a few more dudes,
34:31
and then we'll talk about who I'm picking.
34:32
SPEAKER_01: So next one is going to be somebody who,
34:35
SPEAKER_01: if you listen to this podcast,
34:35
SPEAKER_01: you know I am biased and really love this person.
34:38
SPEAKER_01: They're my trail running crush, and I kind of wax poetic over them.
34:43
SPEAKER_01: That's going to be Manu Marias,
34:45
SPEAKER_01: the Spanish runner for New Balance,
34:47
SPEAKER_01: who lives in the mountains of Spain,
34:49
SPEAKER_01: I think in Leon.
34:51
SPEAKER_01: extremely talented downhill runner, super versatile triathlete.
34:54
His results this year,
34:55
best ones include wins at the Skyrunning World Series final.
34:59
SPEAKER_01: He also won Skyrunning World Series more in Skyline race very decisively.
35:02
SPEAKER_01: And then he won Picos de Europa,
35:04
SPEAKER_01: which is the most competitive,
35:05
SPEAKER_01: but I think it's like his seventh time winning it.
35:07
SPEAKER_01: He also had podiums at Matterhorn Ultra K,
35:10
uh old tracks i guess is how james pronounced it and then uh
35:14
sober sober sobrio sky
35:16
race and uh montzerbion uh however his most impressive
35:20
performance by far was his
35:22
second place at the short trail champs to frederick uh tranchon
35:27
by only three
35:29
minutes so i would say two best performances had to be second
35:32
at worlds and
35:33
SPEAKER_01: probably the win at the sky running world series final
35:35
SPEAKER_01: I think he's probably going to find a spot in my top 10 because one,
35:41
SPEAKER_01: I'm biased towards him,
35:42
SPEAKER_01: quite frankly,
35:43
and try not to be towards US runners too much because I
35:46
recognize that North
35:48
SPEAKER_01: America has the prominence.
35:50
Yeah,
35:52
North America has more trail running media and kind of a bigger
35:54
trail running voice.
35:55
I know Francesco Pupi always talks about how he listens to most
35:58
American trail running podcasts.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: So the goal of this podcast is not to...
36:02
outweigh or to trumpet uh north american trolling results it's
36:05
kind of to highlight
36:06
all of them to the best of my ability and really put a shine a
36:08
light on some
36:09
european and south american and other trolling athletes uh
36:13
asian from around the
36:14
world uh new zealanders uh australians you know everyone else
36:18
basically to uh
36:19
SPEAKER_01: highlight their results and to not be so u.s or north american centric um
36:24
SPEAKER_01: But then two,
36:25
SPEAKER_01: Manu also does have a wide selection of competitive races to choose from,
36:28
and he's very consistent racing on a variety of trains against
36:32
a variety of very
36:33
SPEAKER_01: deep competition.
36:34
SPEAKER_01: So in my opinion,
36:35
SPEAKER_01: that second out Worlds in the win at multiple Skyrunning World Series,
36:40
SPEAKER_01: but most importantly,
36:41
SPEAKER_01: the final gets him into my top 10 or on the edge of my top 10,
36:47
SPEAKER_01: if I had to guess.
36:48
SPEAKER_01: Next one is going to be Ludovic Pomeroy.
36:50
SPEAKER_01: Ludo, doing Ludo things.
36:52
SPEAKER_01: He's freaking Benjamin Button, I got to tell you.
36:54
SPEAKER_01: He turned 50 this year.
36:55
SPEAKER_01: And just like the wine, he's only getting sweeter as he's getting older.
36:59
And so highlights included another one at Hard Rock in a deeper
37:03
field this year in
37:04
a historically fast time to go with his sixth place at UTMB and
37:09
his fastest time to
37:09
SPEAKER_01: finish the race yet,
37:10
SPEAKER_01: albeit on a little bit altered course.
37:12
SPEAKER_01: But one is, of course, not altered.
37:13
SPEAKER_01: I think he ran 2040.
37:15
SPEAKER_01: If I remember correctly, I'm pretty sure.
37:17
And then he went fourth,
37:18
a diagonal day through,
37:20
um,
37:20
is there anything Ludo can't do?
37:22
SPEAKER_01: He's kind of the ageless wonder at this point.
37:24
SPEAKER_02: All right.
37:29
SPEAKER_01: So we went from Ludo to loop, uh, and it's going to be Luca Delpero, uh,
37:35
SPEAKER_01: Italian Sky Running Specialist, Sub-Ultra Specialist.
37:38
Really a breakout year for this Italian Scarpa athlete and
37:41
somebody I really think
37:42
deserves a ton of highlighting and probably will be slept on by
37:45
the largely US
37:45
SPEAKER_01: audience.
37:46
But this is my pitch for you to really pay attention to his
37:49
results and to see how
37:50
SPEAKER_01: good he raced this year.
37:52
SPEAKER_01: Let me lobby for you to consider him in your picks.
37:55
SPEAKER_01: He had wins at four different Sky Running World Series races,
37:59
SPEAKER_01: including Calamara Sky Race,
38:00
SPEAKER_01: Acantilados del Norte,
38:02
SPEAKER_01: Gorgeous Dutarn,
38:03
SPEAKER_01: and Dolomis.
38:05
SPEAKER_01: He had a fourth place at Zagama in a super-duper stacked field,
38:08
SPEAKER_01: fourth place at Skyraced at Mathesin,
38:10
SPEAKER_01: second place at Laboreto 50k to Francesco Pupi,
38:12
SPEAKER_01: seventh at OCC,
38:14
SPEAKER_01: which was the deepest UTMB race of the year,
38:16
SPEAKER_01: and a sixth at World Short Trail to go with his second overall,
38:20
SPEAKER_01: second out of the goals,
38:21
SPEAKER_01: assuming the Skyrunning World Series final,
38:23
SPEAKER_01: just behind Mando Marias.
38:25
SPEAKER_01: He also became the Skyrunning World Series overall champion this year,
38:27
SPEAKER_01: taking the title from Roberto de la Renzi.
38:31
I definitely want you to please strongly consider him in making
38:34
your picks.
38:35
SPEAKER_01: He deserves to be in there or at least damn close to there.
38:38
SPEAKER_01: So consider him strongly.
38:40
SPEAKER_01: Amazing year for Luca Delperro.
38:42
SPEAKER_01: Super consistent racing on a variety of trains,
38:44
SPEAKER_01: variety of races,
38:46
SPEAKER_01: and a ton of super deep fields.
38:48
So that is my pitch for Italian Skyrunner and short distance
38:52
ultra specialist Luca Delperro.
38:55
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be France's very own Louisan Coffey,
39:00
SPEAKER_01: who got second place at the Long Trail Worlds.
39:03
SPEAKER_01: Definitely the best race he had of the year.
39:06
SPEAKER_01: He was only two minutes behind.
39:09
SPEAKER_01: He also ran the Long Trail Qualifier for France's Trail Champions.
39:14
SPEAKER_01: He was only two minutes behind Benjamin Rubiel,
39:17
who ended up tying for second place at Worlds and ended up
39:19
being his roommate and
39:20
SPEAKER_01: teammate.
39:21
I would really like another result to go with Luzon,
39:24
his second place at Worlds.
39:26
SPEAKER_01: Great year for him, though.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: I don't think he has the amount of performances,
39:29
SPEAKER_01: but I think his second at Worlds was really above and beyond for him.
39:32
SPEAKER_01: All right, we're down to the last two males I want to talk about.
39:35
First one is going to be Fred Tranchand,
39:39
the Merrill-sponsored French player.
39:42
SPEAKER_01: orienteer-turned-skyrunning and trail-running athlete.
39:48
He had a marquee career-defining in some ways,
39:52
I would say,
39:52
when at World Short Trail.
39:54
SPEAKER_01: That was probably the most stacked field.
39:57
SPEAKER_01: I think if we look at Travis Longcar's analytics department for the World
40:01
SPEAKER_01: Championships,
40:02
SPEAKER_01: I think it had the highest mean UTMB index for the short trail,
40:07
SPEAKER_01: but I'm going to confirm that right now.
40:08
SPEAKER_01: It might have actually been the long trail.
40:11
SPEAKER_01: which isn't a perfect measure because the classic and uphill,
40:15
a lot of those athletes don't have UTMB indexes because they
40:18
mostly race WMRA
40:19
SPEAKER_01: stuff.
40:19
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, the short trail had the highest...
40:23
SPEAKER_01: mean UTMB index for the top 25.
40:26
SPEAKER_01: So the highest average of the top 25 runners was the short trail.
40:29
SPEAKER_01: So you could say he arguably won the most competitive race.
40:33
SPEAKER_01: And it also had a tighter standard deviation on the long trail.
40:35
SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't as skewed by outliers like the long trail.
40:40
SPEAKER_01: Jim's index is 946.
40:41
SPEAKER_01: So that kind of skewed,
40:42
whereas the short trail is tighter and denser with that level
40:46
of competition.
40:46
SPEAKER_01: So he won arguably the most competitive race with the short trail.
40:51
SPEAKER_01: And it was a super stacked field.
40:54
SPEAKER_01: So really a banner year.
40:55
SPEAKER_01: That's got to be his biggest win, his bigger performance of the year.
40:57
But he also won the French Short Trail Championships qualifying
41:00
race to go to
41:01
SPEAKER_01: Worlds and the VK as well.
41:04
SPEAKER_01: He won Sober Sobio Sky Race, which had a good, dense field.
41:08
Third at the Sky Running World Series final behind Manu and
41:11
Luca del Perro.
41:12
Raced a fourth place at Matterhorn Ultrax and fifth place at
41:16
Skyrace to Matheson to
41:17
SPEAKER_01: start the season.
41:18
SPEAKER_01: Ended up being fourth overall in the Skyrunning World Series final.
41:23
SPEAKER_01: Like I said, Worlds has got to be really weighed heavily.
41:25
And then I think his next best result is probably going to be
41:29
the win at Sober
41:30
SPEAKER_01: Sobio Skyrace or the third at the Skyrunning World Series final.
41:35
SPEAKER_01: So that is Fred Tranchon.
41:37
Last one's going to be John Albin,
41:39
British North Face athlete,
41:40
goat at all distances.
41:42
He didn't race as much as previous years,
41:43
but raced well on three-fourths of his races.
41:46
SPEAKER_01: Unfortunately,
41:46
SPEAKER_01: the one that he whiffed on was UTMB,
41:48
SPEAKER_01: despite being up there with the front pack,
41:50
SPEAKER_01: I think,
41:51
SPEAKER_01: through like 120,
41:52
SPEAKER_01: 130K plus,
41:53
SPEAKER_01: and then things kind of turned south.
41:55
SPEAKER_01: He got a second at Trans Grand Canary to Caleb's course record.
41:58
SPEAKER_01: And under the previous course record,
41:59
SPEAKER_01: from what I can tell,
42:00
he had a win at Ultra Trail Snowdonia 100k by a wide margin
42:04
over Mathieu Blanchard
42:06
and a win at Ultra Pirineau 100k to bounce back from his DNF at
42:08
UTMB and get a late
42:10
SPEAKER_01: season race win.
42:11
SPEAKER_01: So a top three at UTMB would have had him in my,
42:14
SPEAKER_01: probably in my top 10 to go with his Transcrank Canaria.
42:17
But I think the lack of depth of comp at all about Transcrank
42:21
Canaria make it hard
42:22
SPEAKER_01: for me to put him in my top 10 this year,
42:25
SPEAKER_01: but another great year for him.
42:27
SPEAKER_01: So I am done talking about the men's side.
42:32
SPEAKER_01: So now I'm going to talk about my picks that I have right now.
42:35
And I'm going to give you the caveat that I always give
42:39
whenever I give my picks.
42:40
SPEAKER_01: It's that one, there's still five days left.
42:42
SPEAKER_01: They're subject to change.
42:43
SPEAKER_01: They will change.
42:44
SPEAKER_01: I will flip people around.
42:45
SPEAKER_01: So let me know what you think I got right.
42:47
SPEAKER_01: Let me know what you think I got wrong.
42:49
SPEAKER_01: Let me know who you think I'm missing.
42:51
SPEAKER_01: And so I'll give you a top 10.
42:52
And I'll also give you some guys that are kind of on my bubble
42:55
or who I think
42:56
SPEAKER_01: should strongly be considered for that top 10.
43:00
SPEAKER_01: So, all right, let's see.
43:05
SPEAKER_01: One other athlete I left out too,
43:06
SPEAKER_01: Christian Minogio,
43:08
SPEAKER_01: second place at OCC,
43:10
SPEAKER_01: fourth place at Worlds,
43:11
SPEAKER_01: Long Trail.
43:12
SPEAKER_01: And then he won Monteroza-Walserweg,
43:15
SPEAKER_01: Sky Marathon-Santiero,
43:17
SPEAKER_01: and then a handful of other races I'm not quite as familiar with.
43:22
SPEAKER_01: So Christian Minogio-Santiero,
43:25
SPEAKER_01: That's pretty tough.
43:26
Second at OCC,
43:27
which is the deepest UTMB race,
43:28
and a fourth at the World's Long Trail.
43:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's tough too.
43:34
SPEAKER_00: All right, so those are all the men's racers that I wanted to talk about.
43:43
SPEAKER_02: Let's see.
43:43
SPEAKER_02: All right, where to start?
43:47
SPEAKER_02: Sorry, I'm trying to scroll to my results, so give me one second.
44:04
SPEAKER_02: All right, getting the results pulled up.
44:06
SPEAKER_02: All right, so in my mens, we're going to go 10 through 1.
44:16
SPEAKER_02: This is tough.
44:20
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, let's go...
44:23
SPEAKER_01: Let's actually go 1 through 10.
44:24
I think I like 1 through 10 better because it's a little harder
44:26
once we get through
44:27
SPEAKER_01: 5 through 10.
44:28
SPEAKER_01: So 1 through 10, first place, I think has got to be Jim Walmsley.
44:31
SPEAKER_01: I think his range of results,
44:33
SPEAKER_01: I think his depth of competition,
44:34
SPEAKER_01: I think that his performance,
44:37
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
44:37
SPEAKER_01: going back to these criteria,
44:39
SPEAKER_01: depth of competition,
44:40
SPEAKER_01: consistency,
44:40
SPEAKER_01: performance,
44:41
SPEAKER_01: versatility of performance.
44:42
SPEAKER_01: I think he checked all those boxes perfectly.
44:44
And then geographical bias,
44:45
he raced in some of the deepest fields around the world.
44:48
SPEAKER_01: So he checked all those boxes.
44:50
SPEAKER_01: OCC went, deepest field at UCMB, checked.
44:53
Worlds win,
44:53
long trail,
44:54
second deepest field at Worlds,
44:56
and almost nearly the deepest,
44:58
check.
45:00
Won at Chianti in a dominant fashion over the last two UTMB
45:04
champions,
45:04
check.
45:05
SPEAKER_01: Or two of the last three UTMB champions, check.
45:10
SPEAKER_01: And then, yeah, just raced really, really well this year.
45:14
SPEAKER_01: So Jim's got to take my cake for overall trail runner of the year.
45:20
SPEAKER_01: And then...
45:22
SPEAKER_01: This is where it gets a little tough.
45:25
2nd through 4th,
45:26
I'm having a hard time,
45:26
and I'll probably flop some of these guys around.
45:29
SPEAKER_02: So 2nd through 4th.
45:35
SPEAKER_02: Okay, let's see.
45:35
SPEAKER_02: Alright, 2nd through 4th.
45:36
SPEAKER_02: So...
45:51
right now second place this is subject to change and second
45:53
through fourth is very
45:54
SPEAKER_01: malleable but right now second place i've got caleb olsen
45:58
win at western historically fast time win at trans gran canaria
46:01
in a course record
46:02
and historically fast time also won grampians 100 miler that
46:05
wasn't as competitive
46:06
so it's not as much but i'm kind of flipping caleb's definitely
46:10
going to be in my
46:10
top five i don't know that i want him second but right now i
46:13
have him second place
46:14
i know i just said i didn't have a ton of western athletes
46:17
right now i've only got
46:17
SPEAKER_01: three u.s my men's top 10 and only one in the women's side so
46:21
Caleb Olson in second place for right now,
46:22
but that's subject to change potentially.
46:24
SPEAKER_01: Third place, I'm going to go Philemon Carriago.
46:27
SPEAKER_01: I know he's got a range of results.
46:29
SPEAKER_01: I know he didn't win the Golden Trail World Series overall,
46:31
SPEAKER_01: but on merit alone,
46:33
SPEAKER_01: his series and all win in a super stacked field is always 228-31.
46:39
That's got to be one of his best performances of the year to go
46:41
with his World
46:42
SPEAKER_01: Championships Classic Gold Medal.
46:47
SPEAKER_01: Those two results alone would put me over the top,
46:50
SPEAKER_01: but you combine that with wins at a ton of WMRA events,
46:54
SPEAKER_01: Smarna Gora,
46:55
SPEAKER_01: Dion Dixens,
46:58
SPEAKER_01: Trofeo Nisego,
46:59
SPEAKER_01: and then GTS Noly,
47:01
SPEAKER_01: he won,
47:02
SPEAKER_01: and then a bunch of second places at a ton of really good...
47:05
uh wmra and golden trail series i think philemon's got to be in
47:09
your top five guys
47:10
he really had a killer year and those two results alone uh with
47:14
regards to sears
47:15
and all in a gold at world championships those alone carry a
47:19
ton of weight but then
47:20
you're looking at all these other amazing results second at
47:22
broken arrow sky race
47:24
you know second at vertical in the sego second at great wall
47:27
second at kobe trail
47:28
SPEAKER_01: and
47:29
race second as year to mon uphill second at the up down classic
47:33
uh french trail
47:34
championships i mean he just really had an amazing year so i
47:38
think film one's got
47:39
SPEAKER_01: to be out there
47:40
SPEAKER_01: Interesting,
47:40
SPEAKER_01: because I put right now,
47:42
SPEAKER_01: I put him above the fourth place winner who won the Golden Trail Series,
47:45
SPEAKER_01: and that's going to be Elhuzin El-Zawi.
47:48
SPEAKER_01: I think alone, his Zagama win is probably his most impressive result.
47:52
SPEAKER_01: And then if I had to pick his next most impressive result,
47:56
probably a win at the 23K Broken Arrow or the final for the
47:59
Golden Trail Series.
48:02
He also went ninth at Sears and all,
48:03
which is not really his bread and butter race.
48:06
SPEAKER_01: And then won Tepic Trail and won, I guess, Keanu.
48:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, one type of trail.
48:11
SPEAKER_01: So Mexico.
48:12
So I think I got I think I got him in fourth place because I
48:17
don't think his two
48:18
SPEAKER_01: best results are as good as Philemon's two best results.
48:21
So even though he did beat Philemon head to head in most of the
48:25
races that they
48:25
SPEAKER_01: raced except for one.
48:27
SPEAKER_01: Fifth place, I'm going to go.
48:28
SPEAKER_01: This is probably a little bit of a sleeper pick.
48:30
Not a sleeper pick,
48:31
but I don't think people will have him as high as he deserves
48:33
to be.
48:34
SPEAKER_01: And that's going to be Mr. Frederic Tronchon.
48:36
Win at the Short Trail Worlds and then win at multiple other
48:40
Skyrunning World Series events.
48:42
But I think his win at the Short Trail Worlds in what had the
48:46
highest mean UTMB
48:48
SPEAKER_01: index of any of the events and was arguably,
48:51
SPEAKER_01: yeah,
48:51
SPEAKER_01: was definitely the most stacked field.
48:53
SPEAKER_01: His win at the French Trail Championships was a very competitive race.
48:57
uh and then his win at sober sobio uh sky race as well and
49:01
third at the sky run
49:02
world series final i think fred deserves to be in your top 10
49:05
potentially as high
49:06
SPEAKER_01: as top five he's got my top five
49:08
SPEAKER_01: Next one is going to be a fan favorite, Mr. Francesco Pupi.
49:11
He had an amazing year,
49:14
raced a good range of distances from your trail marathon to
49:19
your ultras.
49:21
SPEAKER_01: Two best results were definitely his win at CCC, hands down.
49:23
SPEAKER_01: That was one of the deeper fields at UTMB.
49:29
SPEAKER_01: Well,
49:29
SPEAKER_01: actually,
49:30
SPEAKER_01: I said it was the least deep,
49:31
SPEAKER_01: but it still was historically a very,
49:34
SPEAKER_01: very fast time.
49:35
SPEAKER_01: And there were some heavy hitters up front.
49:37
SPEAKER_01: He won lab rate of 50K again,
49:39
SPEAKER_01: but really his two best results,
49:40
SPEAKER_01: CCC win and when it can,
49:42
SPEAKER_01: is my opinion.
49:43
And then also his ninth at Worlds is really good,
49:45
but not as good as his two wins.
49:46
SPEAKER_01: So that's going to be Francesca Pupi in sixth place for me.
49:49
SPEAKER_01: Seventh place is going to be American,
49:51
SPEAKER_01: but really only kind of,
49:52
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
49:53
SPEAKER_01: he is an American,
49:53
SPEAKER_01: but he lives in France.
49:54
SPEAKER_01: So it doesn't feel quite like picking an American.
49:56
SPEAKER_01: That's going to be Ben Demon.
49:58
SPEAKER_01: He had second place at UTMB,
50:00
SPEAKER_01: winning course record at Lavarado,
50:01
SPEAKER_01: win at Grand Raid Vontu,
50:03
SPEAKER_01: not as competitive,
50:04
SPEAKER_01: but still had some good runners.
50:06
But really driving is going to be a second at UTMB in his
50:08
winning course record at Lavarado.
50:10
SPEAKER_01: So I think even though he's only got three races,
50:12
SPEAKER_01: all of them were hit on the head and they were historically very fast and
50:15
SPEAKER_01: impressive performances.
50:17
SPEAKER_01: Eighth place,
50:18
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to go Patrick Kippenjano,
50:20
SPEAKER_01: second place in the Golden Trail Series overall.
50:23
SPEAKER_01: Key wins.
50:25
SPEAKER_01: He won the two Golden Trail Series races to start the year.
50:28
SPEAKER_01: But really, I would say his third of the Vertical Uphill World Champs.
50:33
SPEAKER_01: And then second at zeros and all were probably his two best results.
50:37
SPEAKER_01: But that goes along with third at Broken Arrow,
50:40
SPEAKER_01: two Golden Trail Series wins at the first two Golden Trail Series races,
50:44
SPEAKER_01: and then a second in the Golden Trail Series final.
50:47
SPEAKER_01: So that's Patrick Campagino.
50:49
SPEAKER_01: And my last two men's picks are going to be two sub-Ultra Goats.
50:53
SPEAKER_01: One of them is going to be Manuel Marias,
50:54
SPEAKER_01: who I already waxed poetic about,
50:56
SPEAKER_01: driven by his results,
50:57
SPEAKER_01: second place at the World Championships,
50:59
SPEAKER_01: win at the Skyrunning World Series Final,
51:02
SPEAKER_01: and win at Mourn Skyline.
51:06
SPEAKER_01: So...
51:07
manu marias and then 10th place is going to be luca del perro
51:11
killer year for the
51:12
italian uh sub ultra and sky running specialist uh we talked
51:17
about four different
51:19
sky running world series wins fourth place at zagama second
51:22
place at laborato 50k
51:24
seventh place at occ sixth at the world trail champs short
51:27
trail um and second at
51:30
SPEAKER_01: the sky running world series final so that's luca del perro
51:33
SPEAKER_01: Those are my top 10 right now.
51:35
SPEAKER_01: Subject to change.
51:36
SPEAKER_01: Definitely could be persuaded to put other people.
51:38
SPEAKER_01: I think Andrew Blaney's rig also had an amazing year.
51:42
SPEAKER_01: I think that... I'm scrolling through the list.
51:45
Cristiano Minogio should also be in a very strong consideration
51:48
for your top 10.
51:49
SPEAKER_01: Second at OCC.
51:50
SPEAKER_01: Fourth at Worlds.
51:51
SPEAKER_01: Long Trail.
51:52
SPEAKER_01: And then a win at a bunch of other Sky Races.
51:54
SPEAKER_01: So Cristiano Minogio should be a really strong consideration as well.
51:59
SPEAKER_00: I think that...
52:01
SPEAKER_00: I'm scrolling and looking who else.
52:07
SPEAKER_01: I think that David Sinclair had another really good year.
52:09
Second at CCC,
52:10
second at JFK,
52:11
and second at Broken Arrow 46K were all really impressive
52:15
results.
52:16
SPEAKER_01: I would have liked one of those to be a win,
52:18
SPEAKER_01: but I think he's definitely somebody that should be considered.
52:21
SPEAKER_01: Davide Magnini,
52:22
SPEAKER_01: win at Giro de Mont,
52:23
SPEAKER_01: win at Marathon de Mont Blanc,
52:24
SPEAKER_01: and eighth at Worlds,
52:25
SPEAKER_01: also a really strong pick for top 10.
52:28
SPEAKER_00: Scrolling through the list.
52:30
SPEAKER_00: Anyone else that I want to talk about?
52:32
SPEAKER_02: Sorry, I'm looking.
52:37
SPEAKER_02: All right, let's see.
52:46
uh who's uh paul machoka was that who i talked about yeah paul
52:51
machoka i think
52:52
honestly had some really amazing results as well and then
52:55
noticeable absences
52:56
you'll notice i didn't talk about tom evans i think the lack of
53:00
a second really
53:00
good competitive result is keeping him off my list uh and that
53:04
makes it tough i
53:04
think his utmb might go up as one of the trail performances of
53:07
the year because it
53:07
really was a dominant time but he didn't have a second
53:10
competitive race that he
53:10
raced in throughout the year so that makes him a little bit
53:13
harder for me to pick
53:16
and those are the big ones sorry i'm scrolling through those
53:21
are the big ones that
53:24
were kind of on the bubble um yeah those are kind of my bubble
53:32
picks as well dan
53:35
SPEAKER_01: jones yeah dan jones is up there too so
53:38
SPEAKER_01: Those are all for your viewing pleasure and consideration.
53:42
SPEAKER_01: And that is my men's top 10.
53:45
SPEAKER_01: And I've been talking for a while.
53:46
SPEAKER_01: So now we are going to get on to the women's top 10,
53:48
SPEAKER_01: which,
53:49
SPEAKER_01: oh my gosh,
53:49
SPEAKER_01: these females had so many good results.
53:52
SPEAKER_01: Amazing year of ultra running.
53:53
SPEAKER_01: Let's drop it.
53:54
SPEAKER_01: And this is going to take a little while to go over them all.
53:58
SPEAKER_02: All right, so...
54:06
SPEAKER_02: The women's field.
54:07
SPEAKER_02: All right.
54:11
SPEAKER_01: Time to dig in.
54:12
SPEAKER_01: All right.
54:12
SPEAKER_01: So the women's field, same considerations as before.
54:15
SPEAKER_01: We're weighing it based off depth of competition,
54:17
SPEAKER_01: consistency,
54:17
SPEAKER_01: performance,
54:18
SPEAKER_01: versatility of performance,
54:19
SPEAKER_01: and geographical bias.
54:21
So digging into the women's top 10,
54:26
Troy,
54:27
let me get my women's field pulled up.
54:30
SPEAKER_01: All right.
54:30
SPEAKER_01: Once again, we're going to go in the order that I wrote them down in.
54:33
SPEAKER_01: First one's going to be Abby Hall.
54:34
SPEAKER_01: She had a career defining win with her win at Western States is here.
54:39
SPEAKER_01: Amazing comeback from a very long road from injury, breaking, uh,
54:43
her leg part of her leg uh in a freak accident her western
54:47
states was amazing it
54:48
was a statement win the rest of her results this year are good
54:51
but not as amazing
54:52
as her western states win as she was just missing golden
54:55
tickets with her fifth
54:55
place at black canyon 100k fourth place at kianti and then she
54:59
had a dnf at utmb
55:01
her ticket rolled down uh the ticket it rolled down for her to
55:04
even get in from in
55:05
SPEAKER_01: case sullivan because she got pregnant um
55:08
SPEAKER_01: So I think top five at UTMB would have gotten her in my top 10,
55:12
SPEAKER_01: no doubt,
55:13
SPEAKER_01: to go with her really amazing win at Western.
55:16
SPEAKER_01: But she didn't have a second big result,
55:18
SPEAKER_01: in my opinion,
55:20
SPEAKER_01: that was strong enough to vault her in my top 10.
55:22
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete,
55:23
this is somebody who I really want to see race a Golden Trail
55:26
Series event or WMRA
55:28
SPEAKER_01: event.
55:29
SPEAKER_01: She basically exclusively runs on the Skyrunning World Series,
55:32
and she basically exclusively beats everyone on the Skyrunning
55:34
World Series in a
55:35
SPEAKER_01: really decisive fashion.
55:36
SPEAKER_01: So it's tough to see where she stacks up.
55:38
She races occasional Golden Trail athletes like Julia Font
55:42
Gomez or Nayara Irigoyen
55:45
SPEAKER_01: or people that occasionally race in the Golden Trail Series,
55:48
SPEAKER_01: but we haven't seen a lot of crossover.
55:50
SPEAKER_01: This is going to be Russian athlete Anastasia Rubstova.
55:54
SPEAKER_01: I think she races as a neutral athlete.
55:57
Pretty much another unbeaten season from her in her
56:00
Scatterrunning World Series overall win.
56:03
She won the series for the second year in a row and was
56:05
undefeated for the second year in a row.
56:09
SPEAKER_01: And...
56:11
SPEAKER_01: Oh, excuse me.
56:11
She lost one race at altitude in the Andes to an Ecuadorian
56:15
runner by two minutes
56:16
SPEAKER_01: in a six hour race.
56:17
SPEAKER_01: So that was her only loss.
56:18
SPEAKER_01: Everything else that she won or she ran,
56:20
SPEAKER_01: she won,
56:21
SPEAKER_01: including the Skyrim World Series championships,
56:23
SPEAKER_01: second straight year.
56:24
SPEAKER_01: So last year I had her in my top 10, I think on the back half.
56:28
SPEAKER_01: She was one of my two sleeper picks.
56:30
SPEAKER_01: It was her and Nina Englehart.
56:32
SPEAKER_01: If I remember correctly,
56:33
I think I had them nine and 10 based off Nina's double gold at
56:37
the Euro trail
56:38
SPEAKER_01: championships up and down.
56:40
SPEAKER_01: We'll talk about Nina here in a little bit.
56:42
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, both of them I had there.
56:44
SPEAKER_01: Like I said,
56:44
I really would love to see her in a UTMB 50K or marathon or
56:50
some kind of golden
56:51
SPEAKER_01: trail series race or something else.
56:54
SPEAKER_01: The ones that she did have here Matterhorn,
56:56
SPEAKER_01: Old Trax,
56:57
SPEAKER_01: Kanabalu,
56:58
SPEAKER_01: Climathon,
56:59
SPEAKER_01: I think in Indonesia,
57:00
SPEAKER_01: Nine Peaks Race,
57:01
SPEAKER_01: Marato Del Dementz,
57:03
SPEAKER_01: the final.
57:05
So the only thing that's annoying about that is the density of
57:07
competition in
57:07
SPEAKER_01: Skyrunning World Series.
57:08
SPEAKER_01: Races is not always as high.
57:10
SPEAKER_01: It's not as high as Golden Trail Series or the UTMB Marquee events.
57:14
SPEAKER_01: So that's the only thing that makes it tough with her.
57:16
SPEAKER_01: We had a lot of ands and anas on this field.
57:20
SPEAKER_01: We had four anas in the top 50 and Annalise and Anastasia.
57:26
SPEAKER_01: So lots of ands that are really good ultra runners.
57:29
SPEAKER_01: Like I said, I think the men's field is a little bit more clear cut.
57:31
SPEAKER_01: The women's was so hard to choose from all these amazing runners.
57:34
SPEAKER_01: So next one's going to be Anna Gibson.
57:36
SPEAKER_01: Went at the U.S.
57:37
Trail Champs races for both the VK at Broken Arrow and the
57:40
Classic Race at Sunapee Scramble.
57:42
She had a third place at Broken Arrow 23K super dense elite
57:46
Golden Trail Series field.
57:48
SPEAKER_01: And then 8th at Sierras in all,
57:49
SPEAKER_01: 3rd at the World Champs Uphill Race,
57:51
SPEAKER_01: and 10th at the Golden Trail Series Final.
57:53
SPEAKER_01: Also just missed top 10 at Zagano with 11th.
57:56
Next to Anna is going to be Erena Tarasova,
57:58
Norder running,
57:59
living in Spain.
58:01
She had a breakout year this year,
58:02
didn't finish lower than 3rd in any of her 13 races.
58:05
Big results for her were 3rd place at CCC in her battle with
58:09
Silvia Nordsgar and
58:09
SPEAKER_01: Martina Larnchuk.
58:12
SPEAKER_01: She got in 3rd, yeah, she was in 3rd just 2 minutes off of
58:16
second and two and a half off the win she won the mount fuji
58:19
kai 70k and laborato
58:21
80k to go second that trans grand canary advanced behind ita
58:23
nelson i don't think
58:24
she has a second result as big as her ccc so that makes it
58:28
tough otherwise i think
58:29
ccc historically was a super competitive and super fast year
58:34
for the utmb uh for
58:36
the ccc women's field next round is gonna be french ultra
58:39
running legend uh and
58:41
SPEAKER_01: lise rousset sponsored by scott
58:44
SPEAKER_01: I think she's the wife to one half of the trail coaching team.
58:48
SPEAKER_01: Her husband is one half of the French trail team.
58:52
She started the year with a win at Transvalconia and some epic,
58:55
crazy weather.
58:56
SPEAKER_01: She also won the Matterhorn Old Trax Mountain Race,
58:59
SPEAKER_01: which was not the Skyrunning World Series event.
59:01
SPEAKER_01: And then she finished the year with a Sixat World long trail race.
59:04
SPEAKER_01: So win at TBC and Sixat Worlds were her two best results.
59:07
SPEAKER_01: Really amazing year for the runner,
59:09
who I think she's announcing her retirement from competitive
59:11
trail running this
59:12
SPEAKER_01: year.
59:12
SPEAKER_01: From what I read on...
59:14
SPEAKER_01: milestone, I want to say.
59:16
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be another French great, Blondine Le Hirondel.
59:20
SPEAKER_01: Wins at Diagonal des Fous in a pretty dominant fashion.
59:24
SPEAKER_01: She won at Marathon to Mont Blanc 90K,
59:26
SPEAKER_01: which is a competitive but not the most competitive field.
59:28
SPEAKER_01: And then she got fourth at CCC.
59:30
SPEAKER_01: So big ones were win at Diagonal des Fous,
59:32
SPEAKER_01: fourth at CCC,
59:33
SPEAKER_01: which is a really densely competitive and fast year.
59:36
SPEAKER_01: Great results and great to good fields and such a versatile runner.
59:40
Blondine can win everything from sub-ultra stuff to the
59:44
longest,
59:44
toughest ultra races.
59:46
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be QE, New Zealand's very own Caitlin Felder.
59:50
Second at TerraWare behind Ruth Croft to start the year,
59:52
really pushed her to that win.
59:55
SPEAKER_01: Win at UTA 50K, which was the oceanic major, I'm pretty sure, for UTMB.
1:00:00
SPEAKER_01: She got her Western States debut,
1:00:02
and then she repeated the win at Le Tempier in a time that was
1:00:05
10 minutes slower
1:00:06
SPEAKER_01: than her win last year,
1:00:07
and it was in a less deep field considering it came right after
1:00:10
Worlds this year.
1:00:11
SPEAKER_01: So Caitlin Felder,
1:00:12
SPEAKER_01: another great year,
1:00:14
highlighted probably by her second at Terrawera and her eighth
1:00:18
at Western.
1:00:20
SPEAKER_01: Next one going to be Kenyan runner Caroline Kimutai.
1:00:22
SPEAKER_01: Two great results, a win at Sierras and all.
1:00:25
That's probably going to be the most iconic because she
1:00:28
finished second at Joylene
1:00:29
SPEAKER_01: and Joylene got disqualified.
1:00:31
SPEAKER_01: And then she also had a win at the Golden Trail Series,
1:00:34
SPEAKER_01: Noli,
1:00:35
SPEAKER_01: to go to the seventh place at Pete's Alpine Glacier.
1:00:37
SPEAKER_01: She also won the Rastonica 50K over Malinosa and Joylene Chepangino.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_01: So...
1:00:44
yeah two really good results her sears and all alone was really
1:00:48
impressive but uh
1:00:50
to win another golden trail series event i think i would like
1:00:52
one more i wish she
1:00:54
had raced worlds i think her name was on the starting list and
1:00:55
i don't think she
1:00:56
ever started so that would be pretty hard to not have her in
1:00:59
your top 10 if she was
1:01:01
one sears and all and worlds but i mean sears and all and gts
1:01:04
and only are both
1:01:06
SPEAKER_01: pretty it's a pretty impressive resume so
1:01:09
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Italian Fabiola Conti,
1:01:12
who impressed a lot of us with her third place at Worlds in a
1:01:15
battle with Sunmaya
1:01:16
SPEAKER_01: Buddha.
1:01:17
SPEAKER_01: Got to be her highlight performance of the year.
1:01:18
Other good results include fifth place at Marathon to Mont
1:01:20
Blanc and a third place
1:01:21
SPEAKER_01: at Mont Zerbion Sky Race for Fabiola Conti.
1:01:25
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be China's very own Fu Zhao Shang.
1:01:29
Highlights of her Western racing calendar was her second place
1:01:34
at Western States
1:01:35
SPEAKER_01: 100 miler yet again,
1:01:38
SPEAKER_01: so really killed it.
1:01:39
SPEAKER_01: 13th place at CCC.
1:01:41
like i said with some of these chinese athletes it's really
1:01:43
tough to judge her
1:01:43
china results because i i unfortunately just don't know that
1:01:46
much about the races
1:01:47
there i want to know more i know some of the big big ones i
1:01:50
feel like saigu uh
1:01:52
ultra trail ninghai and a handful of others are pretty
1:01:55
competitive but it's always
1:01:57
tough to tell and it feels like a lot of the chinese race
1:01:59
athletes race a ton so
1:02:00
some of their good results get kind of muddied in the water of
1:02:03
their other results
1:02:04
because they race so much and it's tough to win every race if
1:02:06
you're racing two or
1:02:07
SPEAKER_01: three times a month so
1:02:09
SPEAKER_01: From what I can tell for Fu Zhao,
1:02:11
her most impressive result in China this year was her second
1:02:13
place at the Ultra
1:02:14
SPEAKER_01: Trail Ninghai,
1:02:15
SPEAKER_01: 105k.
1:02:16
SPEAKER_01: And her UTMB score seems to agree with me on that conclusion.
1:02:19
So we'll say probably her second at Worlds and second at Ultra
1:02:22
Trail Ninghai were
1:02:23
SPEAKER_01: two best results.
1:02:25
SPEAKER_01: It's possible that that should get her in my top 10.
1:02:27
SPEAKER_01: I don't know that it quite will, and I don't know that that's fair.
1:02:31
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, that's kind of where I'm at with that.
1:02:34
SPEAKER_01: Next one's going to be Hao Ha Thi, the Vietnamese runner.
1:02:39
SPEAKER_01: Start off the season with a third at Hong Kong 100K.
1:02:42
SPEAKER_01: Moved on to win Kaolos Penang Sky Race.
1:02:45
And then she raced to sixth place at her Western States debut
1:02:49
and 16th at CCC.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_01: So probably best results, sixth at Western and third at Hong Kong 100K.
1:02:55
SPEAKER_01: She finished this year with a win at the Saigu 105K.
1:02:58
um yeah like i said third at hong kong and sixth at westerns
1:03:03
were probably her best
1:03:04
results in some very deep fields next one's going to be edith
1:03:07
nielsen two strongest
1:03:08
results are her win at trans grand canary advanced over anna
1:03:12
tarasova and fourth at
1:03:13
western states next one's going to be another eda eda emily
1:03:17
amelie robesam
1:03:18
norwegian runner killer year for here she really really crushed
1:03:22
it i can't
1:03:23
emphasize that enough start off with a second place at chianti
1:03:26
marathon if
1:03:30
SPEAKER_01: Zagama,
1:03:30
SPEAKER_01: 8th at Marathon of Mont Blanc,
1:03:32
SPEAKER_01: 5th at OCC,
1:03:34
SPEAKER_01: and then 4th at the Short Trail Champs to finish it off.
1:03:36
SPEAKER_01: So she kind of got better as the year went on.
1:03:39
SPEAKER_01: Definitely 5th at OCC and 4th at Worlds.
1:03:42
SPEAKER_01: That's two back-to-back amazing results.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_01: But then the 7th at Zagama is also really amazing as well.
1:03:48
SPEAKER_01: Like I said,
1:03:48
SPEAKER_01: she got better as the year went on and mostly raced in...
1:03:51
She raced in the most densely competitive fields you can find
1:03:53
with very consistent
1:03:54
SPEAKER_01: and high results.
1:03:55
SPEAKER_01: So how it's off to Eda and Amelie Robesam.
1:03:58
SPEAKER_01: Really amazing year there.
1:04:00
Next one also had a very versatile and very impressive year
1:04:02
from end to end.
1:04:03
That's going to be Canada's Jade Bellsberg,
1:04:06
who I think is living in the States now.
1:04:08
SPEAKER_01: Maybe not.
1:04:09
SPEAKER_01: She might be living in BC.
1:04:10
Really impressive year nonetheless for the Canadian ultra
1:04:14
runner for ultra footwear.
1:04:16
SPEAKER_01: Started the year off with a win at a very sloppy Chuckanut,
1:04:19
SPEAKER_01: followed by second place at Gorge 100k US Long Trail Champs qualifier.
1:04:23
Then she dropped down to the Broken Arrow VK and 23K to race to
1:04:27
third at the ascent
1:04:28
SPEAKER_01: and seventh at the Golden Trail World Series 23K in a deep field.
1:04:33
SPEAKER_01: So third was in the ascent for the U.S.
1:04:35
qualifying uphill race and then seventh at the Golden Trail
1:04:39
World Series 23K in a
1:04:40
SPEAKER_01: very deep field.
1:04:41
SPEAKER_01: She followed that up with a win at the Squamish 50K,
1:04:46
SPEAKER_01: 13th at World's uphill race and finished the year with...
1:04:50
SPEAKER_01: It said third at something, but really it should be a one at JFK.
1:04:56
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so one at JFK just recently.
1:05:00
yeah killer year uh ton of range with her results i think that
1:05:04
she's a really
1:05:05
strong pick for the top 10 based off her criteria her most
1:05:08
competitive race that
1:05:09
she raced was well she raced worlds but her best finish in a
1:05:12
competitive race was
1:05:13
definitely her seventh in the golden trail world series 23k and
1:05:18
then her most
1:05:18
SPEAKER_01: impressive results were probably her win at jfk and uh second place at
1:05:27
SPEAKER_01: second place at the U S long trail champs,
1:05:29
SPEAKER_01: but basically she had really consistent results in,
1:05:31
SPEAKER_01: in deep fields and over across a big variety of distances.
1:05:36
SPEAKER_01: So,
1:05:38
SPEAKER_01: Next one's going to be Canada,
1:05:40
SPEAKER_01: another Canadian athlete,
1:05:40
SPEAKER_01: Jasmine Louther,
1:05:42
SPEAKER_01: Canadian ultra runner for Arcteryx,
1:05:43
SPEAKER_01: another solid year in the books.
1:05:46
SPEAKER_01: Between her performances,
1:05:47
fourth place is at Speedgoat in the same time that she won it
1:05:51
last year in,
1:05:52
SPEAKER_01: and fourth place at World's Long Trail Champs,
1:05:54
SPEAKER_01: where she made a killer comeback and ran through the field,
1:05:57
SPEAKER_01: and ninth place at OCC as well.
1:06:00
Next one's going to be Jen Lichter,
1:06:02
the US Trail Speedster runner for the North Face.
1:06:04
SPEAKER_01: She had a great year,
1:06:05
could have made a strong run for the top 10 with a top five or
1:06:08
three at Worlds.
1:06:10
SPEAKER_01: But unfortunately, she was a did not start due to injury.
1:06:13
SPEAKER_01: She still had a stellar year.
1:06:14
SPEAKER_01: She had a winning course record at Trans Grand Canaria,
1:06:16
SPEAKER_01: Broken Arrow 46K,
1:06:18
SPEAKER_01: and Speed Goat 50K,
1:06:20
SPEAKER_01: breaking the record that's been around since 2010.
1:06:22
So a really good US mountain running schedule minus Trans Grand
1:06:26
Canaria,
1:06:26
which is international.
1:06:27
I would have liked one more deep field to go with Broken Arrow
1:06:30
46K or maybe an
1:06:31
SPEAKER_01: international result.
1:06:33
SPEAKER_01: Still a great year of running, though.
1:06:35
I think her Broken Arrow 46K and a top five at World's Long
1:06:38
Trail could have got
1:06:39
SPEAKER_01: her in the top 10.
1:06:40
And I'm really excited to see what she does moving forward as
1:06:43
she kind of steps it
1:06:44
SPEAKER_01: up in distance.
1:06:45
SPEAKER_01: Next run is going to be the Kenyan athlete for normal.
1:06:50
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be Joyce Najeru, former Golden Trail Series champion.
1:06:54
SPEAKER_01: Not her legendary year from last year,
1:06:56
SPEAKER_01: which she won last year,
1:06:58
SPEAKER_01: but still a lot of solid performances from the sub-ultra specialist.
1:07:03
the her best results are probably her win at broken arrow 23k
1:07:07
that was probably her
1:07:07
best result second place at golden trail series tepik trail in
1:07:11
mexico win at theon
1:07:12
dick sense for like the fourth year in a row that's a swiss uh
1:07:16
running race that's
1:07:16
a fixture on the wmra from what i can tell she had a ninth
1:07:20
place at sierras and all
1:07:21
and a fourth at the world's classic distance just edging out
1:07:24
lauren gregory and a
1:07:26
top and a tight battle so lots of good results lots of debbing
1:07:29
your mra stuff in
1:07:30
SPEAKER_01: there as well um
1:07:33
But probably her two best results are going to be one at Broken
1:07:35
Arrow 23K and maybe
1:07:37
SPEAKER_01: a fourth at Worlds,
1:07:38
SPEAKER_01: if I had to guess.
1:07:40
SPEAKER_01: Speaking of Swiss,
1:07:42
next runner is going to be one of the two Swiss legends in this
1:07:45
top 50 field.
1:07:46
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be Judith Weider.
1:07:49
SPEAKER_01: Rarely do you see athletes that are all ones and twos in their results.
1:07:52
These are going to be athletes like Katie,
1:07:54
Shy,
1:07:54
Jim Walms,
1:07:55
like Killian come to mind.
1:07:57
SPEAKER_01: And Judith is one of the people that's in those categories.
1:07:59
SPEAKER_01: When I pull for results, it's always going to be ones and twos.
1:08:01
SPEAKER_01: And it's always going to be in some super deep fields.
1:08:03
SPEAKER_01: So
1:08:04
SPEAKER_01: This year is unfortunately more seconds than wins,
1:08:06
SPEAKER_01: but she raced in the biggest fields,
1:08:09
SPEAKER_01: um,
1:08:10
SPEAKER_01: and still raced super consistently.
1:08:11
The biggest bummer for Judith is that she didn't finish the
1:08:15
short trail world
1:08:16
SPEAKER_01: champs,
1:08:16
SPEAKER_01: which I think she would have easily gone top five,
1:08:18
SPEAKER_01: probably top three in,
1:08:20
SPEAKER_01: um,
1:08:21
Behind Tove Alexanderson,
1:08:24
she got stung by Wasp and couldn't finish the race.
1:08:26
SPEAKER_01: So that was a big bummer.
1:08:27
SPEAKER_01: Nonetheless,
1:08:28
SPEAKER_01: she had a win at Chianti Marathon by UTMB,
1:08:31
SPEAKER_01: went at the Trans Grand Canary Half Marathon in DK.
1:08:34
SPEAKER_01: And then she had a bunch of second places in super deep fields.
1:08:37
SPEAKER_01: So follow me on this one.
1:08:38
SPEAKER_01: Second place at Zagama to Sarah Alonso in a super deep field.
1:08:42
SPEAKER_01: Second place at the Swiss mountain ring champs to speedster Araya Liachi,
1:08:46
SPEAKER_01: who's also on this list.
1:08:47
SPEAKER_01: She got second at Marathon du Mont Blanc to Joilin Chepengeno,
1:08:51
SPEAKER_01: and that was before Joilin's suspension,
1:08:53
SPEAKER_01: so the result was upheld.
1:08:55
SPEAKER_01: Second at OCC to Miao Yao.
1:08:58
SPEAKER_01: who had a killer race.
1:09:00
And she might've had a shot to win the race if she didn't have
1:09:03
to wait for that
1:09:04
SPEAKER_01: damn train that held her up and kind of put some extra time on the lead.
1:09:09
And then she was in the top 10 each of the previous two years
1:09:13
for the voting,
1:09:14
SPEAKER_01: for the trail running year voting.
1:09:14
SPEAKER_01: She got a sixth in 2023 and a 10th in 2024.
1:09:18
I think she deserves to be in your top 10 yet again this year
1:09:21
without a big win,
1:09:22
SPEAKER_01: but all her second places in some of the deepest fields of the year,
1:09:25
SPEAKER_01: hands down.
1:09:26
another like i said another top five at worlds would have uh
1:09:30
been awesome but alone
1:09:32
her second at occ and zagama i think he's up there and then
1:09:36
second at marathon and
1:09:37
mom belong just kind of sweetens the deal so that's going to be
1:09:41
judith uh next
1:09:42
athlete german runner for hoka katarina hartmuth third at hard
1:09:47
rock and utmb very
1:09:49
nice that's kind of all i have to say about that two really
1:09:52
good results so
1:09:53
next one um this one i'm gonna get on my soapbox uh and make my
1:09:59
case but i'll make
1:10:00
my case in a little bit i think she's got to be your front
1:10:02
runner uh four for a run
1:10:04
of the year yet again uh she won it in 2024 i'm 95 sure i'm
1:10:10
pulling it up yeah she
1:10:12
SPEAKER_01: won it in 2024 for sure so that's gonna be katie scheid um
1:10:16
you know she had a freaking amazing year and i think what did
1:10:20
it for me with her
1:10:22
was going to be so she had a win at world's long trail uh which
1:10:27
once again checking
1:10:28
mr travis long cars analytics department where that's the men
1:10:33
that's the women the
1:10:34
SPEAKER_01: long trail race
1:10:37
SPEAKER_01: had the second highest mean UTMB index behind the short trail.
1:10:42
SPEAKER_01: And it was a little bit skewed by Katie's index.
1:10:45
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, so she won arguably the second most competitive race at Worlds.
1:10:52
SPEAKER_01: And so...
1:10:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
1:10:55
SPEAKER_01: so won the long trail race,
1:10:57
SPEAKER_01: winning course record at Hard Rock,
1:10:58
SPEAKER_01: which albeit isn't a dense field,
1:11:01
SPEAKER_01: but historically significant and has had good racers.
1:11:04
SPEAKER_01: She started off the year with a win at Madeira Island Ultra Trail,
1:11:06
SPEAKER_01: broke Courtney DeWalter's course record by 20 minutes.
1:11:10
SPEAKER_01: From what I can tell, she ran 1420, Courtney ran 1440.
1:11:14
um in the most competitive distance at a classic race there and
1:11:17
then by far the
1:11:17
thing that seals the deal for me though is her throwing down at
1:11:20
sears and all out
1:11:21
of nowhere she goes from hard rock to sears and all gets second
1:11:25
at sears and all
1:11:26
SPEAKER_01: that's just freaking nuts so uh she made moves on uh
1:11:33
i said judith wieter but it wasn't judith wieter it is mon
1:11:36
matthew so she made
1:11:37
moves on mon matthews and other super speedsters on the final
1:11:40
descent to move all
1:11:41
the way up to second place it was third place but it got
1:11:44
upgraded to second with
1:11:45
the join lean stuff so she's got to be the front runner for
1:11:47
troy yet again i think
1:11:49
her resume is hard to be she's got the depth of performance
1:11:51
here isn't always the
1:11:52
biggest sub ultra race she went second at it she's got the
1:11:55
depth of performance in
1:11:56
SPEAKER_01: the long trail so that's the versatility and depth
1:11:58
She's got a winning course record at MIUT over dominant
1:12:00
Courtney in the peak of her career.
1:12:03
SPEAKER_01: And well, Courtney's time, I guess, in the peak of her career.
1:12:06
And then she's also won Hard Rock and broke another Courtney
1:12:11
course record.
1:12:11
SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
1:12:12
SPEAKER_01: That is my pitch for Katie Scheid.
1:12:14
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete,
1:12:15
SPEAKER_01: we have Laura Hottenrott,
1:12:17
SPEAKER_01: German Olympian marathoner turned trail runner,
1:12:20
SPEAKER_01: super-duper speedster.
1:12:21
SPEAKER_01: Really strong results this year.
1:12:23
She had a win at Eiger 51K,
1:12:25
fifth place at Sierras in all,
1:12:26
and three hours flat.
1:12:27
SPEAKER_01: I think it was like three hours, 30 seconds.
1:12:30
Went at Jungfrau Marathon and finished the year with a ninth at
1:12:32
the World's Champs
1:12:33
SPEAKER_01: Uphill Race,
1:12:34
SPEAKER_01: which was stacked.
1:12:35
SPEAKER_01: So kudos to the German athlete.
1:12:37
SPEAKER_01: Amazing year and really some good results.
1:12:40
SPEAKER_01: Next one is going to be U.S.
1:12:42
SPEAKER_01: sub-ultra specialist Lauren Gregory,
1:12:44
collegiate XE star turned pro trail runner for Nike coming out
1:12:48
of University of
1:12:49
SPEAKER_01: Arkansas.
1:12:50
SPEAKER_01: Great year for her.
1:12:52
SPEAKER_01: She had her first Golden Trail Series win at Tepic Trail.
1:12:56
She liked it so much that she said,
1:12:57
hey,
1:12:58
I'm going to win the Golden Trail Series final as well.
1:13:00
SPEAKER_01: So she did that.
1:13:02
SPEAKER_01: She got second at the U.S.
1:13:03
SPEAKER_01: Champs qualifier, Centipede Scramble.
1:13:05
Fourth place at the very densely competitive Golden Trail
1:13:07
Series,
1:13:07
Broken Arrow 23K.
1:13:10
and then in a deep field and then fifth at worlds classic
1:13:12
distance by one second to
1:13:14
joyce so just missed out on well she was in top five uh she
1:13:17
finished the year like
1:13:18
i said with the win at golden trail series final to finish
1:13:20
third overall in the
1:13:20
standings i have a hard time between her and anna gibson
1:13:24
head-to-head they were
1:13:25
very close i think i lean a little bit more towards lauren
1:13:28
because she had a big
1:13:29
win at the golden trail series final and another golden trail
1:13:31
series event um but
1:13:33
SPEAKER_01: anna did get a medal at bronze at uh worlds so
1:13:38
SPEAKER_01: It's really tough.
1:13:39
SPEAKER_01: I think strong arguments could be made for both.
1:13:41
I think they could both be in your top 10 with how good their
1:13:43
results were this
1:13:44
year in super competitive fields and with each having some good
1:13:47
quality wins.
1:13:48
SPEAKER_01: So...
1:13:49
Next athlete is going to be Romania's very own,
1:13:53
the Golden Trail Series champion this year.
1:13:55
SPEAKER_01: That's going to be Madalena Floria.
1:13:57
SPEAKER_01: So Romanian runner for Scott.
1:13:59
This year's winner of the Golden Trail Series overall standing
1:14:01
after a very
1:14:02
consistent and well-planned year with a ton of top threes and a
1:14:05
good number of wins
1:14:06
SPEAKER_01: as well.
1:14:07
SPEAKER_01: She won at Golden Trail Series Noli.
1:14:09
SPEAKER_01: She won ETC by UTMB.
1:14:11
SPEAKER_01: In some other races,
1:14:13
SPEAKER_01: she had second place at Broken Arrow 23K,
1:14:15
SPEAKER_01: second place at Golden Trail Series Kobe,
1:14:17
SPEAKER_01: and the Golden Trail Series Final,
1:14:19
SPEAKER_01: along with a third place at Tepic Trail in the Great Wall Race.
1:14:24
SPEAKER_01: Her lowest result was the 12th place at Sierra's and all.
1:14:26
SPEAKER_01: I think she's got to be...
1:14:29
SPEAKER_01: for sure in your top 10,
1:14:30
SPEAKER_01: maybe even your top five,
1:14:32
SPEAKER_01: uh,
1:14:32
SPEAKER_01: running consistently throughout the year.
1:14:33
SPEAKER_01: Um,
1:14:34
SPEAKER_01: I wish her Sears and all was a little bit higher,
1:14:36
SPEAKER_01: but I mean,
1:14:37
SPEAKER_01: she races the golden trail series races.
1:14:39
SPEAKER_01: Best result was probably her win at ETC by YouTube,
1:14:42
SPEAKER_01: which was deep and her second place at broken arrow 23 K in my opinion.
1:14:46
SPEAKER_01: So,
1:14:47
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete's going to be Spanish sub-ultra superstar Malin Osa,
1:14:53
SPEAKER_01: runner for Solomon,
1:14:54
staple of consistency at the Golden Trail Series circuit and
1:14:57
some longer races on
1:14:58
SPEAKER_01: the calendar.
1:14:58
She started off with back-to-back third places in Golden Trail
1:15:01
Series Kobe and then
1:15:03
SPEAKER_01: third place in Zagama.
1:15:05
She followed by second place at Rastonica Trail 50K and Pete's
1:15:09
Alpine Glacier.
1:15:10
SPEAKER_01: She was a DNF at World Short Trail,
1:15:12
SPEAKER_01: unfortunately,
1:15:13
and then finished the year with a fifth place at the finals in
1:15:16
the Golden Trail
1:15:16
SPEAKER_01: Series.
1:15:18
SPEAKER_01: The finals there.
1:15:19
SPEAKER_01: So really consistent year for the Basque Sub-Ultra Star.
1:15:24
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be Marion Hogan.
1:15:25
SPEAKER_01: Not a lot of results, but two really great ones in ultra.
1:15:27
SPEAKER_01: She got second at canyons,
1:15:28
a hundred K to Emily Hallgood and third at this year's Western
1:15:32
States and a very
1:15:33
SPEAKER_01: gritty battle.
1:15:34
Unfortunately,
1:15:34
Dina,
1:15:35
uh,
1:15:36
Dagan will defu after battling up front for a while.
1:15:39
Next runner had possibly one of the best performances of the
1:15:42
year and is a breakout
1:15:45
SPEAKER_01: star in her own right.
1:15:46
SPEAKER_01: That's going to be Martina Malarnicic,
1:15:48
SPEAKER_01: the Polish breakout athlete for Hoka,
1:15:50
SPEAKER_01: who came out hot in this year's Western States endurance run.
1:15:53
SPEAKER_01: Couldn't stick it, unfortunately.
1:15:55
SPEAKER_01: Had to drop, but bounced back with an amazing performance and win at CCC.
1:15:59
SPEAKER_01: I think she was just two minutes off the course record by Blondie,
1:16:02
SPEAKER_01: and I think it's 11.40,
1:16:03
SPEAKER_01: and she won 11.41 or 11.42.
1:16:05
um had an absolute battle with sylvia north square they were
1:16:09
duking it out late in
1:16:10
the race finished within 18 seconds of each other in an 11 hour
1:16:13
race and they were
1:16:14
just yo-yoing at the end the footage was amazing uh other races
1:16:18
include wins at
1:16:19
istria uh marathon in croatia monorosa valzeray trail marathon
1:16:23
by utmb i would
1:16:25
really like one more big race to go with her when at ccc and
1:16:28
get her in my top 10
1:16:29
SPEAKER_01: um
1:16:31
SPEAKER_01: But her win at CCC,
1:16:32
SPEAKER_01: like I said,
1:16:32
SPEAKER_01: could be very competitive for a trail performance a year candidate.
1:16:36
Knowing how fast that field was and how densely competitive
1:16:39
that field was,
1:16:39
I just wish she had a second densely competitive international
1:16:42
result because I
1:16:43
SPEAKER_01: think she would for sure be my top 10 if that was the case.
1:16:46
Next runner is going to be Swiss sub-ultra legend and former
1:16:50
Golden Trail Series.
1:16:51
SPEAKER_01: Winner making a comeback from injury.
1:16:53
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be Maude Mathis.
1:16:56
SPEAKER_01: Longtime Solomon runner, excuse me, now running for A6.
1:17:00
SPEAKER_01: Really had a bounce back year this year.
1:17:03
SPEAKER_01: Wins at Nerevu Mollesen,
1:17:05
SPEAKER_01: the Swiss uphill race,
1:17:06
SPEAKER_01: in her second fastest time ever from what I can tell.
1:17:08
I think she ran around 108,
1:17:10
109,
1:17:10
or 108 is her course record best time,
1:17:14
excuse me.
1:17:15
SPEAKER_01: 109 is what she ran this year.
1:17:16
um but biggest results for sure were her third at sears and all
1:17:20
which is her go-to
1:17:21
race where she has a course record in a third place at a
1:17:23
stacked occ field she
1:17:25
raced the uphill uh world champs to 16th place and then
1:17:29
finished the year with a
1:17:30
dominant win at chiang mai 50k her third at sears and all third
1:17:33
is occ are by far
1:17:34
her two best results and the dominant one to end the season is
1:17:37
nice cherry on top
1:17:38
SPEAKER_01: um
1:17:40
gonna be close i don't know if that's gonna get her in my top
1:17:43
10 but she did have
1:17:44
an amazing year i think i have her she's kind of right on the
1:17:47
bubble she's one of
1:17:48
those ones that might or might not be in so next runner is
1:17:51
gonna be miau yao uh
1:17:53
chinese athlete for solomon just another stellar year for her
1:17:57
uh she her two
1:17:59
biggest results were her win at occ which was definitely her
1:18:01
best that was the
1:18:02
SPEAKER_01: deepest utmb field uh
1:18:05
SPEAKER_01: by mean UTMB index,
1:18:07
SPEAKER_01: followed by her win at the European UTMB Major 50K Valderan,
1:18:11
although I'd argue her sixth place at Sierra's and All in 301
1:18:13
would probably be on
1:18:14
SPEAKER_01: par with her Valderan win,
1:18:15
SPEAKER_01: given the density of competition and time she ran at Sierra's and All.
1:18:18
SPEAKER_01: She also ran the fifth of the Golden Trail Series Great Wall in China,
1:18:23
SPEAKER_01: I think the OCC win is one of the deepest, if not the deepest fields.
1:18:26
SPEAKER_01: It's got to be weighed extremely well.
1:18:28
SPEAKER_01: And then if you combine that with her other results,
1:18:30
SPEAKER_01: a win at the UTMB 50K major and six at Sears and all,
1:18:35
SPEAKER_01: I think she's got to be somewhere in your top five through eight.
1:18:44
SPEAKER_01: It's tough to say.
1:18:44
SPEAKER_01: I think she's got to be in your top 10 hands down,
1:18:48
SPEAKER_01: but probably even in the top five range we're talking.
1:18:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:18:53
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be Naomi Lang,
1:18:54
SPEAKER_01: breakout year for the 23-year-old Scottish Speedster,
1:18:57
SPEAKER_01: who I think is studying medicine in Scotland,
1:19:00
SPEAKER_01: if I'm not mistaken.
1:19:01
SPEAKER_01: She was announced to the Solomon Gold team this year.
1:19:03
SPEAKER_01: Three was a popular number for her results.
1:19:06
SPEAKER_01: Most of her impressive races were third places.
1:19:08
SPEAKER_01: So she got third place at the World Champs Short Trail Race.
1:19:13
third place at etc by utmb and third place at marathon of mont
1:19:17
blanc she also saw a
1:19:19
win at golden trail series pete's alpine glacier in some super
1:19:22
sloppy conditions
1:19:23
she went 10th at sierras and all in her second crack at the
1:19:25
event and she had a win
1:19:27
at the great britain trail or british trail champs in demanding
1:19:30
fashion at scaffold
1:19:31
sky race shattering the course record so amy lang really
1:19:36
amazing breakout year for
1:19:37
SPEAKER_01: her
1:19:38
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete is going to be Nina Engelhard, German sub-ultra.
1:19:44
Only two,
1:19:45
well,
1:19:45
she had more than two races,
1:19:46
but only two densely competitive deep races.
1:19:49
I mean,
1:19:49
those had to be two of the most densely competitive races of
1:19:52
the year.
1:19:53
SPEAKER_01: The World Trail Champs Uphill and Classic Distance, double gold for her.
1:19:58
SPEAKER_01: Just, I mean, nailed it out of the park.
1:20:00
Has to be top five in my opinion,
1:20:01
even though she did with just two results.
1:20:04
I wish she had one to three more races given with some sub
1:20:06
ultra distances and
1:20:07
SPEAKER_01: considering you can race a lot,
1:20:08
SPEAKER_01: but the two that she raced,
1:20:10
SPEAKER_01: she nailed it against the deepest fields.
1:20:12
SPEAKER_01: She was in my top 10 last year with her double gold at Euro trail,
1:20:15
SPEAKER_01: Euro trail champs up in,
1:20:17
SPEAKER_01: up in classic.
1:20:18
uh and her win at gross glockner slash dole meet and men last
1:20:21
year um so now she
1:20:23
just did the same exact thing this year but on a bigger stage
1:20:26
she did also race and
1:20:26
won the german tramps this year and won by over two minutes
1:20:29
over laura hottenrott
1:20:31
so uh had to get into yeah or decided to race the german trail
1:20:35
champs and then
1:20:37
SPEAKER_00: double back and then just smoked everyone at the uphill
1:20:43
SPEAKER_00: It was off town.
1:20:44
SPEAKER_00: Excuse me.
1:20:44
SPEAKER_00: So Nina Engelhardt, kill you.
1:20:46
SPEAKER_01: All right, we're wrapping up.
1:20:48
SPEAKER_01: We still got a handful of athletes to talk about.
1:20:53
So Nord Van Der Veen went at Tour de Gions and Arc of Attrition
1:20:57
100 miler.
1:20:58
SPEAKER_01: Tour de Gions was amazing.
1:20:59
Arc of Attrition not as dense,
1:21:01
but definitely an athlete worth shouting out.
1:21:03
SPEAKER_01: Next athlete's going to be another Swiss star,
1:21:04
SPEAKER_01: Araya Liachi,
1:21:06
SPEAKER_01: up and coming young sub-ultra speedster,
1:21:09
following in the footsteps of the other Swiss mountain running
1:21:11
grades like Maude
1:21:12
SPEAKER_01: and Judith.
1:21:13
SPEAKER_01: Great year for her.
1:21:15
She got a win at the Swiss National Mountain Running Champs
1:21:17
over Judith Wider in a
1:21:18
SPEAKER_01: tight race,
1:21:19
SPEAKER_01: 24 seconds.
1:21:20
And then she got another top five at Sears and all in fourth
1:21:23
place this year.
1:21:24
SPEAKER_01: Another amazing time for her.
1:21:25
Third place at the Classic Distance at Worlds to go with a 17th
1:21:29
at the uphill race.
1:21:30
So two best results definitely were her fifth place at Sears
1:21:34
and all and her third
1:21:35
SPEAKER_01: place at Worlds.
1:21:35
SPEAKER_01: That's a really good one-two punch for the Swiss youngster.
1:21:42
next one uh if we're talking about versatility of performance
1:21:45
and consistency she
1:21:47
really characterizes both of those metrics it's gonna be rosa
1:21:50
laura filu the
1:21:51
spanish trail runner for scarpa and compress sport she's kind
1:21:56
of like the luca del
1:21:57
perro of racing this year or the roberto de lorenzi of last
1:22:00
year and by that i mean
1:22:01
she does not miss a top 10 in anything she races and really for
1:22:04
her it was like top
1:22:05
SPEAKER_01: seven or top five sometimes she has a huge range all over the board he uh
1:22:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
1:22:12
she has really had a rise in sub-ultra trail running and just
1:22:17
trail running in
1:22:17
SPEAKER_01: general over the past two years.
1:22:18
SPEAKER_01: And it's been linear and it's been super impressive.
1:22:21
SPEAKER_01: I love to look at her lineup from this year.
1:22:22
SPEAKER_01: She started her year off with three fourth-place finishes in a row,
1:22:26
SPEAKER_01: all three of them extremely competitive races.
1:22:28
SPEAKER_01: So Golden Trail Series Noli.
1:22:31
uh zagama and marathon of mont blanc so uh two golden trail
1:22:35
races but zagamas
1:22:36
really kind of transcends golden trail marathon of mont blanc
1:22:39
used to be golden
1:22:39
trail but still deeply competitive so three fourth place
1:22:43
finishes followed by sixth
1:22:44
SPEAKER_01: place and probably the most stacked field of the year at occ
1:22:47
fifth place at the world long trail championships so we're
1:22:51
talking about a 10 plus
1:22:52
hour race and she finished off with a seventh at golden trail
1:22:55
series final so the
1:22:56
range and versatility and consistency of her racing is
1:22:58
impressive and she should
1:22:59
definitely be considered for everyone's top 10 based strongly
1:23:03
off those results all
1:23:12
SPEAKER_02: right so next athlete is going to be
1:23:16
SPEAKER_01: Ruth Croft, marquee win at UTMB, lining up head-to-head with Courtney.
1:23:24
SPEAKER_01: First one to win all the UTMB majors, OCC, CCC, and UTMB.
1:23:28
SPEAKER_01: Did it in an awesome fashion with a calibrated race.
1:23:31
SPEAKER_01: Perfect pass of Courtney beyond halfway.
1:23:33
SPEAKER_01: That's obviously got to be her biggest performance of the year.
1:23:36
SPEAKER_01: Other good results included a win at Terra Awera,
1:23:39
where she was pushed by Caitlin Fielder and had good
1:23:41
competition about five or six
1:23:43
SPEAKER_01: deep.
1:23:43
SPEAKER_01: She won the maxi race 60K in France.
1:23:45
SPEAKER_01: And then I feel like the UTMB one was great,
1:23:48
SPEAKER_01: but it was a little bit diminished with Worlds so close by.
1:23:51
SPEAKER_01: And the most competitive race was definitely OCC in the women's field.
1:23:56
SPEAKER_01: Or I think it was CCC followed by OCC followed by UTMB.
1:23:59
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it wasn't...
1:24:03
uh as competitive as it is in non-world years still an amazing
1:24:06
win but i don't
1:24:06
think she has a second big win kind of similar to tom evans
1:24:09
where uh tara ware
1:24:11
albeit is more competitive than tom evans most second most
1:24:13
competitive race but i
1:24:14
don't think it's quite enough to get her in my top five but
1:24:17
probably enough to get
1:24:18
SPEAKER_01: her in the top 10.
1:24:20
SPEAKER_01: Next runner, one word to describe her season.
1:24:23
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
1:24:24
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be Sarah Alonso, the A6 Spanish trail runner.
1:24:29
SPEAKER_01: Stellar year for Sarah Alonso.
1:24:31
SPEAKER_01: Huge range of races and super, super deep fields.
1:24:35
SPEAKER_01: Really stacked list of people.
1:24:36
Started off the year with a win at Kobe Trail Golden Trail
1:24:39
Series race and a fourth
1:24:40
SPEAKER_01: of the Golden Trail Series Great Wall,
1:24:42
SPEAKER_01: followed by a statement win at her beloved Zagama.
1:24:46
SPEAKER_01: She followed that up with a stupid cow injury,
1:24:49
SPEAKER_01: but fortunately bounced back in even better shape.
1:24:52
SPEAKER_01: And she bounced back with a fourth place in a deep field at OCC,
1:24:57
SPEAKER_01: second place at Worlds short trail behind Tobey Alexanderson's stupid,
1:25:02
SPEAKER_01: crazy trail performance a year performance.
1:25:05
SPEAKER_01: She went third at the Golden Trail Series final in Sky Trentino.
1:25:09
SPEAKER_01: So like I said,
1:25:09
SPEAKER_01: the win at Zagama,
1:25:11
SPEAKER_01: second at Worlds,
1:25:12
SPEAKER_01: fourth at OCC are arguably her best results,
1:25:14
SPEAKER_01: followed by the win at Kobe Trail.
1:25:16
SPEAKER_01: and third at Golden Trail Series final, in my opinion.
1:25:19
She's got to be a top five block for anyone's picks and
1:25:21
potentially even top three.
1:25:23
SPEAKER_01: Amazing year,
1:25:23
SPEAKER_01: versatility results,
1:25:25
SPEAKER_01: Spanish,
1:25:25
SPEAKER_01: and she missed two or three months a year because of stupid calendry.
1:25:28
SPEAKER_01: So, Sara Alonzo, put her in your picks.
1:25:31
SPEAKER_01: Book her.
1:25:33
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Scout Adkin.
1:25:34
SPEAKER_01: Great year for the English Sub-Ultra WMRA specialist.
1:25:37
I really thought she could make a push for podium at Worlds in
1:25:40
the Classic and
1:25:40
SPEAKER_01: Uphill races based off her season.
1:25:43
But she had a disappointing outing in 15th and 16th place for
1:25:46
her Worlds results.
1:25:47
SPEAKER_01: Before that, she won the Giro de Mont Uphill in a very stacked field.
1:25:51
of vk and mountain running crushers she got second in the
1:25:54
french vk champs second
1:25:55
at both trophy and nasego and vertical nasego both of which
1:25:58
have stacked fields i
1:26:00
think her wmra results are great but won't be quite enough to
1:26:02
get her in my top 10
1:26:03
without the podiums or a better result at worlds but she really
1:26:06
did start off the
1:26:07
year amazing and i do feel good that i picked her for worlds
1:26:10
even though she didn't
1:26:11
SPEAKER_01: do well because she had an amazing year of wmra races before that
1:26:15
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Sunmaya Buda,
1:26:16
SPEAKER_01: Nepalese legend and Kalos Fuga athlete,
1:26:19
SPEAKER_01: who had a low-key crusher of a season.
1:26:20
SPEAKER_01: And a lot of you guys are going to sleep on her,
1:26:22
SPEAKER_01: but this is my PSA to not sleep on Sunmaya Buda.
1:26:25
SPEAKER_01: She booked the end of her season,
1:26:26
SPEAKER_01: two dubs,
1:26:27
SPEAKER_01: Hong Kong 100K to start the season,
1:26:29
SPEAKER_01: just finished the year with a dominant UTCT to end it.
1:26:32
I think she even raced at the Chiang Mai just to get stones and
1:26:36
went top three at
1:26:36
SPEAKER_01: that,
1:26:37
SPEAKER_01: even though it was like two weeks after UTCT.
1:26:39
SPEAKER_01: So she won the Ultra Trail World Tour.
1:26:42
SPEAKER_01: And then in between that,
1:26:43
she casually ran to second place at the Worlds long trail
1:26:46
behind Katie Scheid,
1:26:47
SPEAKER_01: battled with Fabiola Conte to get that second place.
1:26:49
SPEAKER_01: So second place at Worlds is definitely her best result of the year.
1:26:54
SPEAKER_01: But then that kind of combo of UTCT and Hong Kong 100K,
1:26:57
SPEAKER_01: two amazing results and two really good fields.
1:27:00
SPEAKER_01: So you better consider Sumaya Buddha and you not sleep on her.
1:27:05
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be finish runner Susanna Sapunki,
1:27:09
SPEAKER_01: who had her two best results this year were second in the world's uphill.
1:27:14
SPEAKER_01: So second,
1:27:14
SPEAKER_01: so she got silver medal at world's uphill,
1:27:16
SPEAKER_01: 15 seconds behind Nina Englehard,
1:27:18
and then she got seventh at Sears in all in a very speedy 302
1:27:21
finish time.
1:27:24
Other good results include a win at Velika Planina WMRA race in
1:27:28
Slovenia and a
1:27:29
SPEAKER_01: seventh place at Giro de Mont uphill in a very stacked field.
1:27:32
Not quite good enough for my top 10,
1:27:33
but really worth highlighting how great of a year she had.
1:27:38
SPEAKER_01: Next runner is going to be Sylvia Nordsgaard,
1:27:39
SPEAKER_01: Norwegian runner for Hoka,
1:27:40
SPEAKER_01: who's always been consistent and speedy.
1:27:42
SPEAKER_01: Really stepped it up a notch this year.
1:27:44
SPEAKER_01: Her best result was by far her battle with Martina Milarnicic,
1:27:47
which got her second place by 18 seconds at CCC in a
1:27:52
historically fast time.
1:27:53
I think they were second and third overall in finish times ever
1:27:56
in that race.
1:27:57
SPEAKER_01: Her other best result this year was her second at UTMV Valderan 50K,
1:28:00
SPEAKER_01: which was the Euro major she got behind Mao Yao.
1:28:05
SPEAKER_01: So those are her two best results.
1:28:06
And then she had a 15th at Worlds,
1:28:08
which was a bit disappointing coming on the heels of her CCC.
1:28:10
SPEAKER_01: Her CCC was one of the races of the year in a super deep or dense field.
1:28:16
SPEAKER_01: And TDA is good, but not quite on that level of density of comp.
1:28:19
SPEAKER_01: So I would say she has two results, but only one marquee result.
1:28:22
And the other one's good,
1:28:23
but not quite the world-class density of competition.
1:28:29
Last two runners I want to talk about,
1:28:30
first one's going to be Tara Dower.
1:28:32
SPEAKER_01: Great races for Tara Dower, the US-based runner for Ultra.
1:28:38
SPEAKER_01: She had a course record at Javelina,
1:28:40
SPEAKER_01: second place at Black Canyon at 100K under the previous course record.
1:28:44
SPEAKER_01: Behind Riley Brady's new horse record,
1:28:46
she had a win at Lake Sonoma 50k to go with as well for the
1:28:49
same reasons as Riley
1:28:50
SPEAKER_01: Brady,
1:28:51
SPEAKER_01: which I think I forgot to mention Riley earlier in the podcast,
1:28:54
which is going to be a lack of finish at Western States and
1:28:57
results in a good
1:28:58
SPEAKER_01: globally competitive race beyond the US.
1:29:00
SPEAKER_01: I think I'm going to have to leave her off my list.
1:29:02
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't appear.
1:29:03
SPEAKER_01: It does appear.
1:29:04
SPEAKER_01: She did just race in an international,
1:29:06
SPEAKER_01: the UTMB Chiang Mai race,
1:29:08
SPEAKER_01: got fifth place in it in a good field,
1:29:10
SPEAKER_01: but not much depth beyond her in fifth places.
1:29:13
SPEAKER_01: Most of the depth in the field was in front of her.
1:29:15
SPEAKER_01: So Tara Dower, amazing year.
1:29:18
SPEAKER_01: I think a win at Western,
1:29:19
SPEAKER_01: not a win at Western,
1:29:20
but a top five at Western would have put her higher in my
1:29:22
results with a course
1:29:23
SPEAKER_01: record at Javelina and second at Black Cannon.
1:29:25
SPEAKER_01: But I think it's very North American centric, her racing.
1:29:30
and not quite as much as international fields last runner who
1:29:33
we have to mention
1:29:34
and i just wish she had one more result um that's gonna be toby
1:29:38
alexander's and she
1:29:39
only had two results on the year one was the cam frank marathon
1:29:41
which she won did
1:29:42
it as a tune-up for the worlds came back out and just freaking
1:29:46
dominated worlds
1:29:47
we'll talk about trail performance in the year in a different
1:29:49
podcast i think and
1:29:50
i'll make a lobby and try to get that out in the next two days
1:29:53
um but i wanted to
1:29:54
SPEAKER_01: get this one out first
1:29:55
SPEAKER_01: Toby Alexanderson has got to be trail performance of the year.
1:29:57
SPEAKER_01: Her short trail,
1:29:58
SPEAKER_01: hands down,
1:29:59
SPEAKER_01: highest Etra index ever,
1:30:00
SPEAKER_01: dominated the field,
1:30:02
SPEAKER_01: ran her way through the men's field,
1:30:03
SPEAKER_01: beat our freaking David Sinclair and Eli Hemming.
1:30:06
SPEAKER_01: Just insane.
1:30:07
SPEAKER_01: You know, high Etra index of all time.
1:30:10
i could go on and on toby alexanderson's i just wish she had a
1:30:13
second globally
1:30:14
competitive race or second race that she did to go with it
1:30:17
because she could easily
1:30:18
potentially be true under the year as well just with that
1:30:21
performance and one other
1:30:22
globally competitive performance um but that is miss toby
1:30:25
alexanderson so that is
1:30:28
SPEAKER_01: my female picks
1:30:32
SPEAKER_01: or excuse me, females that I want to talk about.
1:30:34
With that being said,
1:30:35
we're also going to go one through 10,
1:30:36
same caveats as before.
1:30:37
SPEAKER_01: A, I'm going to change these.
1:30:38
SPEAKER_01: B, I can be persuaded and include people that I left out.
1:30:41
SPEAKER_01: And C, it's not a finished list.
1:30:43
SPEAKER_01: And I'll give you some bubble picks as well.
1:30:45
First through 10th,
1:30:45
first place,
1:30:46
I'm going to have Katie Scheid,
1:30:47
none other than Depth,
1:30:50
of competition versatility of performance what's the other
1:30:52
metrics consistency
1:30:54
performance and versatility performance she checked all those
1:30:56
boxes death of
1:30:57
competition she won the world trail long champ she raced at
1:31:00
sears and all that's
1:31:01
essentially two of the most competitive not the two most
1:31:03
competitive races in the
1:31:04
world this year uh she won one and got second at the other so
1:31:09
what more do i need
1:31:09
to say from that and those were two very different races a 10
1:31:12
plus hour race and a
1:31:13
SPEAKER_01: three hour race
1:31:14
so uh that winning course record at hard rock winning course
1:31:17
record at madeira
1:31:18
island ultra trail uh no geographical bias on this one yes
1:31:22
she's a u.s ultra runner
1:31:23
she's my only u.s ultra runner in the women's top 10 that i
1:31:25
have right now i think
1:31:27
she has the season of yeah of all time so um next athlete is
1:31:32
going to be this one
1:31:33
SPEAKER_01: is this is where it gets tough it honestly gets really tough um
1:31:37
my top five will probably swap around excuse me swap around um
1:31:41
i'm pretty set on my
1:31:43
overall winners for the men's and women's um but my two through
1:31:46
four are both kind
1:31:46
of up there right now in second place i've got sarah alonzo in
1:31:51
my second place
1:31:52
because of what we just talked about depth of competition check
1:31:55
she raced the
1:31:55
deepest fields in in the world this year consistency check and
1:31:59
versatility check so
1:32:01
SPEAKER_01: win at zagama super deep field um
1:32:05
SPEAKER_01: And Ranger performance.
1:32:08
SPEAKER_01: So second at Worlds, also super deep field.
1:32:11
SPEAKER_01: Amazing performance.
1:32:12
SPEAKER_01: He had wins at Kobe, Golden Trail Series Kobe.
1:32:17
SPEAKER_00: And then let me get her pulled up again.
1:32:22
SPEAKER_00: Where did she go?
1:32:24
SPEAKER_00: Second.
1:32:25
SPEAKER_00: So this is, I was just going off the top of my head for that.
1:32:27
SPEAKER_01: And now I'm just going to try to pull up her actual.
1:32:31
SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
1:32:32
SPEAKER_01: What did we talk about?
1:32:33
SPEAKER_01: So.
1:32:35
SPEAKER_01: Second at Worlds, win at Zagama, win at Kobe, and then she got...
1:32:40
SPEAKER_01: Fourth at OCC, also one of the most competitive races in the world.
1:32:44
SPEAKER_01: Second at World Short Trail.
1:32:48
SPEAKER_01: Third at Golden Trail Series Final.
1:32:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, just killed it.
1:32:52
So I think that's pretty damn impressive and really an amazing
1:32:57
range of results.
1:32:57
SPEAKER_01: I think she's got to be in the top five.
1:32:59
SPEAKER_01: I kind of oscillate.
1:33:00
SPEAKER_01: I might move her a little bit down, but I think she has a stellar resume.
1:33:04
SPEAKER_01: Third place I'm going to go, Nina Engelhardt.
1:33:07
as many races as i would like but i mean winning double gold in
1:33:10
the uphill and the
1:33:11
classic to the most densely competitive races in the world this
1:33:15
year i think that's
1:33:17
tough to beat i think it's enough to take the cake it's kind of
1:33:19
like if toby
1:33:20
alexanderson had just had one more world-class result i think i
1:33:23
would have her up
1:33:23
SPEAKER_01: there with nina as well
1:33:25
SPEAKER_01: Fourth place,
1:33:25
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to go Mao Yao,
1:33:27
SPEAKER_01: driven by her win at OCC and her win at the UTMB PDA Valderand,
1:33:34
SPEAKER_01: the 50k Euro trail champ,
1:33:38
SPEAKER_01: UTMB major is what I'm trying to say,
1:33:39
SPEAKER_01: and her sixth at Sierra's and all.
1:33:41
SPEAKER_01: So that's Mao Yao.
1:33:42
SPEAKER_01: OCC was one of the deepest fields, if not the deepest field for UTMB.
1:33:47
And then sixth place at Sierra's and all is no joke to go with
1:33:51
a win at the UTMB.
1:33:55
50k major so fourth is gonna be meow yeah fifth is gonna be
1:33:59
Judith Weider for me no
1:34:01
big wins but seconds in some of the deepest fields of the year
1:34:03
second at OCC second
1:34:05
at Marathon of Mont Blanc second at Zagama I wish she had a
1:34:09
world trail champs top
1:34:10
five to go with that and I think she if she finished that race
1:34:13
she would have for
1:34:14
sure gone top five probably even top three if I had to guess
1:34:17
but I still think her
1:34:18
SPEAKER_01: results are strong enough to carry the day and put her up there
1:34:21
sixth place is going to be slept on but please do not sleep on
1:34:23
her as miss sunmaya
1:34:25
buddha we talked about her second at worlds i was by for her
1:34:28
best result in the
1:34:29
deepest field probably her highest utmb index but let's not
1:34:32
sleep on the fact that
1:34:33
she just won utct and start off the year with the win at the
1:34:37
ultra trail hong kong
1:34:38
she also had one at other races in china chingdu 60 mountain
1:34:42
yun by utmb 30k
1:34:44
SPEAKER_01: annapurna marathon
1:34:46
SPEAKER_01: And then she just got fourth at Chiang Mai,
1:34:48
SPEAKER_01: Thailand,
1:34:48
even though she raced like literally two weeks after Ultra
1:34:51
Trail Cape Town.
1:34:52
SPEAKER_01: I think it was probably just to get into UTMB next year.
1:34:54
SPEAKER_01: So seventh place, I'm going to have the Golden Trail Series winner.
1:34:58
madalina floria i wanted to put her higher um her best results
1:35:02
are by far her first
1:35:03
at etc second i broken her 23k and win it uh golfer de la sola
1:35:08
uh noli she had a
1:35:10
ton of one through thirds like basically always podiumed at
1:35:14
golden trail series
1:35:15
races uh except for sierras and all she got 12th um but
1:35:19
everything that she raced
1:35:19
at she went one through three at but just didn't quite have the
1:35:22
marquee wins but i
1:35:23
SPEAKER_01: think winning the golden trail series final
1:35:25
second place at kobe trail third place at uh gts great wall uh
1:35:29
third win at uh gts
1:35:31
noli or golf a day solo it's the same thing broken arrow 23k
1:35:35
second place tepik
1:35:36
trail third place and then win at etc and a second at the final
1:35:40
so i think she
1:35:41
deserves a spot in the top 10 i wish she had done a little bit
1:35:44
better at sears and
1:35:45
all or racing in their marquee race like zagam or something
1:35:47
like that but um she
1:35:49
SPEAKER_01: won the golden trail series final
1:35:51
SPEAKER_01: Haid's place is going to be UTMB winner Ruth Croft.
1:35:53
I think a lot of people are going to have her higher just based
1:35:56
off her UTMB,
1:35:56
SPEAKER_01: but I kind of feel similarly to Tom Evans,
1:36:00
SPEAKER_01: where she has a better second big win than Tom,
1:36:05
SPEAKER_01: and that she won Tarawara,
1:36:06
SPEAKER_01: which was a deeper field,
1:36:07
SPEAKER_01: and she was pushed and she ran extremely fast.
1:36:10
um but i still don't think she has a second you know if she had
1:36:13
won transvalcania
1:36:14
and not dnf'd it i think i'd have a stronger argument and i
1:36:17
think she deserves to
1:36:18
be in the top 10 but i just don't think i have her as high
1:36:21
because i think utb was
1:36:22
not the deepest field um it was probably the fifth or sixth
1:36:26
deepest woman's race of
1:36:27
the year um not the deepest in my opinion so and and based off
1:36:32
travis's analytics
1:36:33
SPEAKER_01: as well
1:36:34
SPEAKER_01: Ninth place, this is somebody that can be talked out of and might move.
1:36:37
SPEAKER_01: Ninth and tenth,
1:36:38
I'm kind of on the fence looking at a few different females and
1:36:42
could be persuaded
1:36:44
SPEAKER_01: to move some people in and out.
1:36:47
SPEAKER_01: Ninth place right now,
1:36:47
SPEAKER_01: I've got Mod Mathis,
1:36:48
SPEAKER_01: carried primarily by her third at OCC and her third at Sears and all,
1:36:52
SPEAKER_01: two of the deepest races in a decent range,
1:36:55
SPEAKER_01: a three-hour race and a six-hour race.
1:36:58
SPEAKER_01: Um,
1:36:58
SPEAKER_01: but she also won Nerevu Mollison,
1:36:59
SPEAKER_01: uh,
1:37:00
SPEAKER_01: and then also just recently won Chiang Mai 50,
1:37:03
SPEAKER_01: uh,
1:37:04
SPEAKER_01: by UTMB in a pretty dominant fashion.
1:37:06
SPEAKER_01: So that's, uh, Mon Mathis, Swiss Sub-Ultra Legend.
1:37:09
SPEAKER_01: 10th place right now,
1:37:10
SPEAKER_01: I've got Naomi Lang,
1:37:11
SPEAKER_01: uh,
1:37:11
SPEAKER_01: powered by her third place at the World Short Trail Championships.
1:37:16
SPEAKER_01: And, uh, her...
1:37:18
SPEAKER_01: Let's see what else.
1:37:19
Third place at World Short Trail,
1:37:21
third place at ETC,
1:37:22
and third place at Marathon to Mont Blanc.
1:37:25
SPEAKER_01: She also went 10th at Sierra's and all.
1:37:27
SPEAKER_01: And...
1:37:30
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so that's kind of what it is.
1:37:31
SPEAKER_01: And she won Pete's Alpine Grey Show, another Golden Trail Series event.
1:37:34
SPEAKER_01: So that was my top 10.
1:37:37
SPEAKER_01: Bubble picks,
1:37:37
I think that Anna Gibson and Lauren Greger are both really good
1:37:41
picks for that 9th,
1:37:42
SPEAKER_01: 10th place,
1:37:43
SPEAKER_01: 8th through 10th that I have.
1:37:45
SPEAKER_01: Tough to say head-to-head.
1:37:46
SPEAKER_01: I think I give the head-to-head to Lauren.
1:37:49
SPEAKER_01: But it's tough because Anna did beat her for the U.S.
1:37:52
SPEAKER_01: Champs.
1:37:53
SPEAKER_01: Also beat her, I want to say, at Broken Arrow 23K.
1:37:55
SPEAKER_01: But...
1:37:59
SPEAKER_01: And also did get a medal at Worlds, whereas Lauren didn't.
1:38:01
But Lauren did have two wins at Golden Trail Series events and
1:38:05
also had a fifth at
1:38:06
SPEAKER_01: Worlds,
1:38:07
SPEAKER_01: so just off the podium.
1:38:08
And it was really just off fourth place,
1:38:09
so really almost one spot off the podium there.
1:38:14
Other runners that I would strongly consider for my top 10,
1:38:20
I'm scrolling through the list.
1:38:22
SPEAKER_01: Blondine had a really good year with the results that we talked about.
1:38:26
SPEAKER_01: Jade Bellsberg, I really think has the versatility of performance.
1:38:29
SPEAKER_01: I think she would be a very, very strong pick for a top 10 as well.
1:38:34
SPEAKER_02: All right, cool.
1:38:42
SPEAKER_00: All right, I'm scrolling down, looking at some more.
1:38:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Lauren Gregory, Ana Gibson.
1:38:49
SPEAKER_01: Malinosa had another really good consistent year.
1:38:53
SPEAKER_01: I wish Martina Milarnaschuk had a second really big result.
1:38:59
Uriah Liachi,
1:39:01
her two big results,
1:39:02
third at World Classic Distance and fourth at Sierra Zanol.
1:39:07
SPEAKER_01: I think that Carolyn Kimetai had two really amazing results as well,
1:39:11
SPEAKER_01: her one at Sierra Zanol and her one at Kobe,
1:39:14
SPEAKER_01: assuming not Kobe,
1:39:15
SPEAKER_01: at Golden Trail.
1:39:17
SPEAKER_01: Great Wall is what I was looking for.
1:39:20
um yeah so those are all all ones that i consider strongly
1:39:23
anastasia rubstova with
1:39:24
a dominant skyrunner world series uh sweep more or less minus
1:39:28
one race so those are
1:39:30
SPEAKER_01: all strong picks as well on the female side so once again uh let me know
1:39:37
SPEAKER_01: What do you think I got right?
1:39:38
SPEAKER_01: Let me know what you think I got wrong.
1:39:40
Feel free to comment anyone that you're missing or you feel
1:39:42
like I left out.
1:39:42
SPEAKER_01: Like I said,
1:39:43
SPEAKER_01: I didn't talk about everyone because we're at,
1:39:45
SPEAKER_01: what,
1:39:46
SPEAKER_01: freaking an hour and 40 minutes.
1:39:47
This is probably going to be my longest podcast of me just
1:39:49
sitting here and droning
1:39:50
SPEAKER_01: on into the microphone.
1:39:52
SPEAKER_01: But please, I hope this helps you make your picks.
1:39:55
SPEAKER_01: Make sure you make your picks.
1:39:57
SPEAKER_01: And every time you submit them,
1:39:58
SPEAKER_01: it just saves it,
1:39:59
but it doesn't ever close the voting or moving around your
1:40:01
picks until December
1:40:02
SPEAKER_01: 16th.
1:40:03
So as I'm finishing this,
1:40:04
you guys have five days and 14 hours to make your picks.
1:40:08
Please make them,
1:40:09
make them wisely,
1:40:09
review the criteria when you're making your picks.
1:40:12
SPEAKER_01: And I hope that you enjoy this and that you find it helpful.
1:40:16
SPEAKER_01: It might or might not be the last podcast of the year.
1:40:18
SPEAKER_01: So thank you for everyone that's followed along throughout the year.
1:40:20
SPEAKER_01: It's our 31st podcast this year.
1:40:24
And I guess that doesn't include the ones going on the steep
1:40:27
stuff podcast,
1:40:28
SPEAKER_01: but 31st podcast of this year.
1:40:31
SPEAKER_01: So that's exciting.
1:40:31
I'm going to try to get one out for trail performance of the
1:40:33
year if my work schedule allows.
1:40:35
But as always,
1:40:36
thank you for listening to listening along,
1:40:39
following along.
1:40:40
This has been Let's Talk Trail Running and I hope you have
1:40:43
enjoyed it and learned something new.